July 31, 2010

A Little Music, Just Because

I was rummaging around YouTube, looking for something else entirely, when I came across this old favorite, an Elton John album track. Some may find it controversial, or even a bit sacrilegious, but I think all of us have known moments when we've asked just such questions.

Sorry about the loss of your 66 dogs; maybe the cunts should have stayed at home.

OCCUPIED KABUL, Afghanistan – NATO announced Friday that six more U.S. troops have died in Afghanistan, bringing the death toll for July to at least 66 and surpassing the previous month's record as the deadliest for American forces in the nearly 9-year-old war.

In Kabul, police fired weapons into the air Friday to disperse a crowd of angry Afghans who shouted "death to America," hurled stones and set fire to two vehicles after an SUV, driven by U.S. contract employees, was involved in a traffic accident that killed four Afghans on the main airport road, according to the capital's criminal investigations chief, Abdul Ghaafar Sayedzada.

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Off the top of my head I can't recall the name of the tenured professor who used the term Little Eichmans in reference to the victims of the World Trade Center attack. Our enemies walk freely among us and are laughing at our diversity and tolerance.

Sorry, Charlie -- Obama Can't Fix The Racial Climate He And His Supporters Have Created

Over at the NY Times, Charles Blow is now calling on Barack Obama to play the role of racial healer in these racially divisive times.

Americans are engaged in a war over a word: racism.

Mature commentary on the subject has descended into tribal tirades, hypersensitive defenses and rapid-fire finger-pointing. The very definition of the word seems under assault, being bent and twisted back on itself and stretched and pulled beyond recognition.

Many on the left have taken an absolutist stance, that the anti-Obama sentiment reeks of racism and denial only served to confirm guilt. Many on the right feel as though they have been convicted without proof — that tossing “racism” their way is itself racist.

The “racists crying racism” meme is being pushed hard, on multiple fronts, all centered around the president.

Of course, from that point on, every negative example is someone on the right -- as it always is when Charles Blow writes. But not to worry -- there is a savior on the horizon!

Whether the president likes it or not, he’s the nexus of this debate. I, for one, think that he should stand up and redirect it from the negative to the noble. There will be some grumbling to be sure, but there already is.

It’s your choice, Mr. President. I say stand up — for America, for common humanity, for civil discourse. To paraphrase the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., they can’t ride your back unless it’s bent.

Here's the reality -- virtually every American welcomed the accession of an African-American to the presidency, even those of us who opposed his platform, voted against him, and dedicated ourselves to the task of thwarting the implementation of policies we viewed as bad for America. Yet time and again, criticism of Obama has been labeled as racist, and the sort of rough-and-tumble criticism of the man that was deemed acceptable when applied to George W. Bush (right down to the words "Nazi", "Fascist", "Hitler") was declared prima facie evidence of racism by Obama supporters and the lap-dog media that never really gave the man the sort of scrutiny that a candidate of a lighter hue would have faced. Dissent was no longer patriotic -- it was racist. Add to that Obama's own "typical white person" and "acted stupidly" comments, and it is clear that the genesis of the worst racial climate in the last 40 years is Obama and the Obama-loving Left.

Does that mean that there are not a few mutts out there on the Right who are racists? Hardly -- but that racist fringe is exactly that, a fringe, and has been repeatedly denounced and rejected by everyone from the leaders of the GOP to the Tea Party to conservative media and bloggers like myself. But the reality is that there are easily as many racists on the Left -- from Jeremiah Wright and Louis Farrakhan to the New Black Panther Party to the Sherrods -- who are permitted to be a part of the mainstream and are often embraced by liberals as positive examples. Indeed, Blow's regular knee-jerk assertion that opposition to the president is based in racism is part and parcel of the problem.

By the way, want proof that the opposition to Obama from the Right is not racist? Consider the candidates the Tea Party members are backing with their votes and their donations -- Tim Scott, Nikki Haley, Raul Labrador, Alan West, Charlotte Bergmann, among others -- and ask how all these minority candidates (who oppose the Obama agenda) can be favorites among grassroots conservatives if their movement is really all about hating the fact that there is a black man in the White House.

Sorry Charlie, but Obama, his surrogates and supporters, and the sycophantic media have created this climate of racial strife -- to expect Obama to somehow magically undo it with a few words is absurd.

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July 30, 2010

Judging A White Woman By The Color Of Her Skin, Not Her Skills Or Character

Could you imagine the outrage if there were outrage over a black fashion editor being hired by a fashion magazine?

With the country as divided as ever on race, some turmoil has boiled over into the fashion world: Essence, a magazine that targets African-American women, has hired a white woman, Elliana Placas, as its fashion director.

With the announcement came a deluge of reaction seemingly triggered by a Facebook post by Michaela Angela Davis, a former fashion director at Essence. “It’s with a heavy heart I’ve learned Essence Magazine

has engaged a white Fashion Director. I love Essence and I love fashion. I hate this news and this feeling. It hurts, literally. The fashion industry has historically been so hostile to black people – especially women. The 1 seat reserved for black women once held by Susan Taylor, Ionia Dunn-Lee, Harriette Cole (+ me) is now-I can’t. It’s a dark day for me. How do you feel?” Her prompt brought more than comments in response, the majority affirming Davis’s contention.

“Bravo @EssenceMagazine 4 takin steps to rid the Jim Crow-like mentality in women fashion
editorial” tweeted one supporter. Others sided with Davis,“Big deal at least to me. Not doubting Elliana Placas’ skills or anything, but it’s what Essence stood for that makes it O_o.”

Davis argued that it is inappropriate for a white woman to head a section of a magazine whose readers are black women. “When you say that you are the one magazine that is there to reflect and celebrate the African-American woman through the very specific filter of the African-American woman experience, you put race in, you put race in your brand,” she said Tuesday on Anderson Cooper 360.

Now Essence targets a niche market -- black women -- so I'd agree that they have put race in their brand. But having done so does not exempt the magazine from the laws that apply to every other business. Given American civil rights law, you are not allowed to put race in your brand by limiting your pool of candidates for employment based upon their race.

Now if Michaela Angela Davis wants to come out and argue that America's laws banning racial discrimination in employment should be repealed, then I'm all for her doing so. Indeed, I consider that to be a legitimate position to take -- that the government has no business dictating who a business hires, even if the employment decisions are made on the basis of irrational, morally reprehensible criteria, because one aspect of liberty is the freedom of those in the private sector to make their own decisions on how to operate their business. But i don't think that is what she is doing here -- do you?

No, just as Essence has put race in their brand, Michaela Angela Davis has put racist in her brand. I'm sure she will soon be coming out with a lovely line of designer sheets for the fashion-forward black bigot. Will Shirley Sherrod be her spokes-model?

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In a logical world it would make sense that a magazine for blacks might want a totally black staff. It would make sense that a school for men might want a totally male staff and student body. But somewhere along the way logic was thrown out in favor of "selective" bias and now it seems what goes around comes around. I could imagine this all might get worse before it gets better. Now, who's fault would that be???

An Observation Regarding KOSsack's Suggestion Of Death For Global Warming Dissenters

I always love it whensomeonesuggests that death is the appropriate punishment for disagreement with their most dearly held beliefs. Whether we are talking about Muslims, Animal Rights idiots, or run of the mill liberals like those who engaged in acts of terrorism at the 2008 Republican convention (and others who were stopped), it betrays a combination of fanaticism about their cause and insecurity about its correctness that would be hysterically funny if it were not so morally repugnant. So I've had a nervous chuckle or two over this idiot who apparently wields some authority over at Daily Kos, and his lack of tolerance for dissenters on his pet cause.

Right about here I'd like to insert a symbolic suggestion about how climate change skeptics might best serve their fellow man in the future Soylent Green world they're eagerly foisting on the rest of us. I'd like to, but the Examiner Overlords feel this would be in bad taste, no pun intended, so you'll have to use your imagination.

Actually, that isn't what he originally posted -- his editors yanked the original, which read as follows.

If only the Soylent Corporation were publicly traded, or better still, if only [global warming skeptic Steve] Milloy and his buddies could check into one of the company's lovely medical suites for a short nature movie and a glass of wine.

Yeah, that's right -- if you dare to disagree with him on this issue, you deserve death.

Of course, he has a right to say something so stupid and so morally reprehensible. After all, it is still a free country (though the Obama goons are working to make it less so every day). After all, he didn't -- quite -- make a threat against us, and even if it were read as a threat it would be so generalized as to be legally unactionable despite its moral bankruptcy.

But the reality is that he's got it quite wrong -- in fact, completely ass-backwards. It is not those of us who question the impact of humanity on global climate who need to commit suicide. Rather, it is those who believe in anthropomorphic global warming and the need to reduce the human population who have a moral obligation to off themselves for the good of the planet.

Now hear me out, and consider the logic of that statement.

You have a group of people who argue that there are too many human beings making too much of an impact on the planet, and that the current population is unsustainable. To save the planet, they tell us, we need to reduce that impact -- ultimately only possible by reducing the population. Well, there is a quick and easy way of doing so, if one is not a hypocrite -- and that is leadership by example. By their own admission, THEY are a part of the problem and that problem needs to be solved now. By taking action jointly and singly, they can reduce the population of the planet by a billion or two overnight, and do so by nobly martyring themselves on behalf of the planet. What's more, in doing so they demonstrate their moral superiority over the rest of us by making the ultimate sacrifice for the planet and all its inhabitants of every species.

The only fly in the ointment is that folks like Steven Andrew and the rest of the global warming cultists are flaming hypocrites who would prefer to take away the personal autonomy of the rest of humanity to accomplish their goals rather than exercising their own personal autonomy to do so. So until I hear of Heaven's Gate style "evacuations" of the planet by large groups of believers in anthropomorphic global warming, I'll simply continue to view them with the contempt they deserve because of their unwillingness to put everything on the line to save the planet.

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Wasn't that the theme of Clancy's "Rainbow Six," a group of environmental activists attempt to complete the Ebola weaponization of "Executive Decisions" and kill >>99% of the human race, so they could live in a "perfect" world without people?

Rich Dems Snookered By Obama

The big spenders who shelled out $30,400 a head for dinner with President Obama at the Four Seasons restaurant and at Anna Wintour’s house didn’t actually break any bread with him.

After starting Tuesday night at a dinner for 60 high-rolling Democratic supporters hosted by hedge-fund billionaire Marc Lasry, Obama headed to a private room at the Four Seasons to wolf down steak, potatoes and broccoli with two aides before heading to Wintour’s Greenwich Village home.

A fool and his money will soon be parted. Looks like we know who the fools are. I wonder if this song will run through their heads when the next fundraising letter from the Democrats arrives.

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July 29, 2010

A Raffle For Charity

John Hawkins at RWN is really pushing this raffle for a great cause -- one that I can whole-heartedly endorse both in terms of the genuine good works of the organization and the incredible nature of the prizes.

The winner of Meet Me in Manhattan will bring the companion of his/her choice to share the entire prize package.

Air Travel:

The Meet Me in Manhattan winner will receive roundtrip airfare for two to New York. Airline to be determined after city or town of residence of winner is identified.

Meet Bill O’Reilly

The Meet Me in Manhattan winner will visit Fox News Channel’s studios in Manhattan and meet Bill O’Reilly. Mr. O’Reilly is the undisputed king of cable television news. For the past ten years, “The O’Reilly Factor” has reigned as the world’s top-ranked cable TV news program, breaking records for “most viewers” in almost every measurable category. A wildly successful author, Mr. O’Reilly’s 9th book will be released in the fall of 2010. Four of his books zoomed to #1 on the New York Times bestseller list. Mr. O’Reilly has made countless appearances as a guest on such national programs as Late Night with David Letterman, The Tonight Show, Good Morning America, The Today Show, The View and Oprah. He has traveled to all 50 states and 72 foreign countries, and has earned Master’s degrees from both Boston University and Harvard. The Meet Me in Manhattan winner will enjoy the experience of watching Bill O’Reilly host an edition of “The O’Reilly Factor.”

Four days/three nights of accommodations at the world renowned Essex House

The Meet Me in Manhattan winner will enjoy never-to-be forgotten, three-night accommodations in a luxury two-bedroom apartment, a spectacular property from the famous Lauren Berger Collection, overlooking Central Park at the world renowned Essex House.

Dinner at BoBo Restaurant hosted by celebrity chef Patrick Connolly

Winner will enjoy dinner at the acclaimed upscale restaurant, BoBo, where one of America’s top chefs, Patrick Connolly, rules the kitchen. Patrick’s brother, Dan, is a 318-pound lineman for the NFL’s New England Patriots. Dan knows how to eat, and Patrick knows how to cook! A native of St. Louis, Patrick achieved smashing success at Radius in Boston. After winning the James Beard award as the top chef in the northeastern United States, Patrick moved to BoBo in New York where his inventive cuisine has wowed patrons and critics alike. In recent months, Patrick has exhibited his culinary creations on ABC-TVs Nightline, NBC-TV’s Today Show, and CBS-TV’s Early Show. An unforgettable dining experience will be enjoyed by the Meet Me in Manhattan winner at BoBo.

Two Tickets to a Major League Baseball Game at Yankee Stadium

In 2009, the House That Ruth Built, Yankee Stadium, was replaced by the new Yankee Stadium. Debuting in the most expensive and elaborate baseball stadium ever built, the legendary Yankees won the World Series in their first season in their new home. America’s Great Raffle winner will see the Yankees take on the Tampa Rays, who stunned the baseball world with their first ever trip to the World Series in 2008. With the Rays getting off to the best start in the Major Leagues in 2010, their rivalry with the Yanks is heating up in the American League Eastern Division. There’s nothing like September baseball at Yankee Stadium in New York during the heat of a pennant race!

Two Tickets to a Broadway Show

Imagine walking on Broadway in the autumn air to one of many legendary theaters to see some of the world’s greatest stars perform. In the last year, more than 12 million people paid more than $1 billion to see the stars on Broadway. Pending ticket availability, the Meet Me in Manhattan winner will have excellent seats at the Broadway show of their choice!

A $3,000 Shopping Spree

In the world of shopping, there’s nothing like strolling down 5th Avenue to shop at some of the finest stores in the world. Try on the Manolo Blahnik shoes at Niemen Marcus, or shop Saks 5th Avenue (the original!), Bloomingdale’s, Tiffany’s, Louis Vuitton, Salvatore Ferragamo, Cartier, FAO Schwarz and countless others. Stuffed with $3,000 of Meet Me in Manhattan prize money, the winner will engage in a shopping spree to remember forever!

SECOND PRIZE

Round-trip airfare for two anywhere in the continental U.S.

THIRD PRIZE

Two tickets to the 2011 Super Bowl .

FOURTH PRIZE

Two tickets to the 2011 MLB All-Star game.

FIFTH PRIZE

$1000 furniture shopping spree at Weekends Only.

That's right, folks; this raffle is so incredible that two Super Bowl tickets are only the THIRD PLACE prize. And first place? 4 days in New York? Catching O'Reilly's show? A $3000 shopping spree? Plus everything else? That is absolutely amazing -- and the $100 a ticket? It's for a great cause.

Clintons To Stay At Home Of Nazi Collaborator's Daughter For Chelsea's Wedding

Another area manse rumored to be serving the family over the weekend will be Glenburn, where the Clintons are said to be staying over the weekend. Glenburn is the Rhinebeck home of Eric and Andrea Colombel. Andrea Colombel is the daughter of billionaire financier and longtime Clinton supporter George Soros.

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Soros' record as a Kapo and Nazi collaborator is outweighed by his current role as the owner( just ask MoveOn) and financier of the Democrats.

Actually, Soros was not really a Clinton supporter, but perhaps the daughter and Chelsea are friends.

Obama is Soros' creature (just as Kerry was in 2004) and Soros was instrumental in denying Mrs. Clinton the nomination she actually won through his power over the superdelegates.

A Public Service Announcement From The Obama White House

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Thanks, I just posted this video to Facebook along with a thank you note. Facebook acts up quite a bit and would not take a direct link to your article on this one; but did take the embedded link, go figure...

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Chris Matthews Comes Out Against Affirmative Action

Well, at least when the beneficiaries are white in a black dominated profession.

>

Of course, the premise here is entirely wrong. There are, and have been, a number of superb white players throughout NBA history. However, basketball has been the sport of poorer, more urban populations for several generations, and the NBA has reflected that since its beginning. That was true when the early stars of the league were of Jewish and Irish descent, and will continue to be true when, one day, some ethnic croup other than blacks dominates the game. The reality is that the game involves little investment in equipment and infrastructure, unlike games like football and baseball, which require large open spaces -- something historically less likely to be generally available in urban settings than in suburban and rural settings.

But I agree with the folks over at Weasel Zippers in their reaction to Matthews' comment -- "Give me a break, Tingles is an asspuppet…"

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Primary Challenge For Obama?

Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell predicted on Tuesday that if the president escalates America’s military involvement in Afghanistan he could very well face a primary challenger in 2012.

And why shouldn't Obama face a primary challenge in 2012? His popularity and approval are plummeting, he has made repeated missteps, and is arousing discontent within his own party among those who were his base in 2008. It seems to me that those all add up to reasons he should be challenged -- from both his right and his left -- by his fellow Democrats.

And since he is on his truly becoming the worst president since Jimmy Carter, it seems only appropriate that he get the same treatment from his fellow Dems that Carter received in 1980, when Teddy Kennedy challenged the sitting president.

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July 27, 2010

Bill White: Support Disenfranchise The Troops

I grew up as a military dependent. My dad spent a chunk of my childhood in a place called Vietnam. And I remember he and my mom always making an effort to register to vote in whatever community we lived in, because of the importance of making sure that there were good schools and good services in that community, because in most places we did not live on base and so could not take it for granted that the US military would be taking care of those matters. My parents paid taxes, just like every other member of the community. And when I turned 18, a military dependent, I registered and cast my vote in North Chicago, Illinois, where the Great Lakes Naval Training Center is located. I therefore have some strong opinions about protecting the right of our troops and their families to vote.

Unfortunately, that cannot be said of the Democrat running for governor here in Texas. Just so you know, here is where Sanctuary City Bill stands on the matter of allowing American patriots to vote.

In 1997, Texas Democrats filed an election contest seeking to overturn the results of two local elections in Val Verde County (Del Rio), claiming that soldiers stationed at Laughlin Air Force Base weren’t eligible voters. In two races, Val Verde County voters narrowly elected a Republican sheriff and county commissioner. Democrats argued that military voters could vote in federal elections but not local elections unless they had prior ties to the community.

* * *

Eventually, Texas courts ruled that the military votes were valid.

* * *

Democrats responded by trying to disenfranchise military voters in local elections in the 1997 legislative session. Then-Rep. Hugo Berlanga (D-Corpus Christi) offered an amendment that made it much more difficult for military voters in local elections. The Berlanga amendment was backed by the vast majority of Democrats and was adopted over the strenuous objection of the senior Republican on the House Elections Committee at the time, Rep. Jerry Madden (R-Richardson). The bill to which the Berlanga amendment was attached died in the Senate. White was quoted in The Abilene Reporter-News defending the Berlanga amendment. (Click here to read).

July 26, 2010

Illegal Immigration Creates Own Potential Health Crisis

Here is a list of things people applying for visa/residency status in this country may be tested for during their physical exam as required by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s Citizenship and Immigration Services.

Under the immigration laws of the United States, a foreign national who applies for an immigrant visa abroad, or who seeks to adjust status to a permanent resident while in the U.S., is required to receive vaccinations to prevent the following diseases:

Guess what -- when they illegally cross the border, immigration criminals potentially bring with them a host of medical problems that the American people will likely end up paying for. What's more, their failure to have the required vaccines makes them potential bearers of communicable disease to such a degree that they are a public health threat. And this does not get into the question of an illness like swine flu (a bullet we dodged) being carried across the porous border by "good, hard-working people who just want to do the jobs Americans won't."

Practical impact? Uncommon parasites are showing up in the blood supply, and illnesses that were nearly wiped out in this country (such as TB) are seeing an upswing. As I've said so many times -- illegal immigration is a national security issue. Apparently we must also consider it a public health issue as well.

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Notice that he implicitly admits that FoxNews did not have anything to do with pushing the Sherrod story before she was fired.

The Obama team did not question, let alone challenge, the video. Instead, it assumed that whatever narrative Fox News might create mattered more than anything else, including the possible innocence of a human being outside the president's inner circle.

Notice that the problem for the "Obama team" (not Obama, who is apparently so out of touch that he was never consulted or briefed before they took action) -- a sign of a rudderless White House out of control and in damage-control mode) was afraid of what Fox might do, not what they had done or were doing. If these people cannot act in a calm, coherent and rational way when confronted with the possibility that the media might put out critical news stories, how can we trust them to deal appropriately with a major crisis that threatens American national security?

Mr. Obama's Great Dem-pression To Continue Until Further Notice

The White House said Friday it expects that unemployment will stay at or above 9% until 2012, but at the same time forecast that the economy will grow by at least 4% in 2011 and 2012.

Now let me get this straight -- growth without jobs? How, exactly, is that going to work? Seems to me that we are talking about something other than growth here. And expect to hear soon about the need to increase the time for unemployment benefits even further, with some Americans on the public dole for three, four, and even five years. So work hard, Americans -- the unemployed are depending on you for their next paycheck.

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July 25, 2010

NT Times' SCOTUS Scare Story

When Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. and his colleagues on the Supreme Court left for their summer break at the end of June, they marked a milestone: the Roberts court had just completed its fifth term.

In those five years, the court not only moved to the right but also became the most conservative one in living memory, based on an analysis of four sets of political science data.

* * *

The recent shift to the right is modest. And the court’s decisions have hardly been uniformly conservative. The justices have, for instance, limited the use of the death penalty and rejected broad claims of executive power in the government’s efforts to combat terrorism.

But scholars who look at overall trends rather than individual decisions say that widely accepted political science data tell an unmistakable story about a notably conservative court.

But interestingly enough, the Roberts court appears to be very close to where the American people are on most of the issues before it, based upon the NY Times own "How Your Views Compare With the Court" interactive feature. Let's look at the six questions asked:

"In general, do you agree or disagree that an individual should have a right to have a registered handgun at home?" The Roberts Court says "yes" -- but then again, so do 81% of Americans.

"Would you favor or oppose a ban in your state on abortions performed late in the term of a pregnancy, also called partial-birth abortions?" The Roberts Court says "yes" -- and so do 73% of Americans.

Do you agree that corporations should be able to spend their profits on TV ads urging voters to vote for or against candidates in a coming election? Finally, one where the Roberts Court is at odds with the American people -- 58% of the American people say "no" while the Roberts Court says "yes". But while support for these particular speech restrictions is a politically liberal position, isn't giving expansive protection to First Amendment rights a traditionally "liberal" position?

"Should noncitizens suspected of terrorism and detained in U.S. military prisons be able to challenge their detentions in the U.S. civilian court system?" Both the Roberts Court and the American people take the liberal position -- but anyone with a firm grasp of the history of the treatment of captured enemies during time of war recognize that the decision in Boumediene v. Bush (2008) was at odds with the sorts of protections historically allowed POWs and captured enemy combatants by the federal courts.

"Should the government be allowed to apply the death penalty for a person convicted of raping a child?" The Roberts Court has said "no" on this one -- but two-thirds of Americans support allowing the execution of sex offenders in heinous cases such as these. Thus the Roberts Court is more liberal on the issue than the American people.

"Should a state be allowed to sentence to life in prison a person under age 18 for armed burglary?" The Roberts Court took the liberal position in opposition to such sentences -- a position that some 64% of Americans also hold.

Did you catch that, folks? The frighteningly conservative Roberts Court took the conservative position only half the time. What's more, in the 50% of cases where it disagreed with the American public, only once was it more conservative than the country -- this conservative court took a position that was more liberal than the American public twice as often as it took positions more conservative than the people!

What does that tell me? That while the Supreme Court has certainly shifted right, that change has brought it closer to the American mainstream than it has been at any time during my lifetime. I don't know about you, but I find that to be comforting rather than frightening.

1 Out Of 1 Doctors Agree: Obama Is An Incompetent Wuss

When Wallace interrupted Dean to point out that Fox did not air the excerpted Sherrod footage until after the Obama administration had fired her based on it , Dean shot back “It was about to go on Glenn Beck, which is what the administration was afraid of.”

We'll set aside the question of whether or not Glenn Beck was or was not going to air that piece -- quite frankly, it is irrelevant whether or not he was. The key point is that Howard Dean, Chairman of the DNC, has made it clear that Barack Obama isn't man enough to stand up and take it like a man when criticized by a television and radio commentator, and is willing to take dramatic action to prevent such criticism -- even if that means acting without knowing what the full story is. Hardly a good quality in a president -- indeed, a sign of incompetence as a president, if you stop and think about it.

Unless, of course, one accepts the point made by Shirley Sherrod, that Barack Obama knew nothing of her firing and that nebulous people within the Obama White House fired her without Obama's knowledge or consent and did not even brief him on their actions -- in which case Obama is not n charge of his own White House staff -- a sign of incompetence, if you stop and think about it.

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Racism In Democrat Nomination Race In Tennessee's CD9

Sadly, the two candidates involved have caused me to be unable to condemn it. I'll highlight it, of course, but as I promised back in April, I will not defend Rep. Steve Cohen, the individual on the receiving end, because he has proven himself to be a despicable bigot himself, unworthy of any public office.

MEMPHIS (AP) — In the city where the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated, a once-unbeatable black former mayor wants the Democratic Congressional primary to be a referendum on race.

Willie W. Herenton, the former mayor, is accusing Steve Cohen, the white two-term United States representative, of “trying to act black.” He tells voters in this majority-black city that they “need to come off that Cohen plantation and get on the Herenton freedom train.”

Do I believe that Tennessee needs, as Herenton claims, at least one black member of Congress? No, I don't -- Tennessee needs competent members of the House and Senate who have the good of the state and the country at heart. Race (and religion, a factor in earlier campaigns) are irrelevant. Unfortunately, all the Democrats have to offer in this district are race-baiting bigots, and so I don't think that Steve Cohen is worthy of my defense this time around, nor is Willie Herenton any more worthy of condemnation than his opponent. They have both forgotten the lessons of Martin Luther King, and defiled the city where his blood was spilled.

But the people of the 9th Congressional district in Tennessee do have an alternative -- Charlotte Bergmann. Want a candidate who believes that people should be judged by the content of their character, not the color of their skin? Vote for Charlotte Bergmann. A candidate who rejects irresponsible government spending and political corruption? Vote for Charlotte Bergmann.

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July 24, 2010

JournoList Listserv: You Will Never Find A More Wretched Hive Of Scum And Villainy.

JournoList listserv: You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy.

Well, a large chunk of the membership of the JournoList listeserv has been released. let's take a look at who was conspiring together to advance the Obama campaign, fantasizing attacks upon or the death of conservatives, or covering up the same. Now tell me why any of these individuals are still employed, given their compromised credibility (excluding the professors, of course -- being a liberal with compromised credibility is a job requirement at many institutions).

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ICE Fails To Detain Illegals In Custody In Order To Deport Them

Normally, I would be praising federal authorities for actually doing something to enforce our nation's immigration laws, given the way that they have been allowed to more or less lapse in recent years. But this story disturbs me.

More than 100 federal agents and local police served the federal arrest warrants Saturday afternoon at the Sunny Flea Market on Airline Drive near Gulf Bank Road. The members of a multi-agency anti-fraud task force piled out of unmarked trucks and vans around 2 p.m.

Witnesses reported that some agents screamed "Don't run!" in Spanish as people fled the flea market.

Michael Feinberg, the acting special agent in charge for investigations for Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Houston, declined to provide details Saturday about the specific type of document fraud the suspects were accused of committing, saying they were selling a "variety of IDs."

Now upon reading that, you would think that this is a good thing -- and I'll agree that it is. However, the infuriating part appears in the next paragraph.

Lance Solano, a 29-year-old illegal immigrant from Guerrero, Mexico, said he was at the flea market shopping for phone cards when he heard yelling and saw the agents pouring out of vehicles. Solano said he was detained with the other shoppers for about 20 minutes.

Feinberg said agents were targeting only the suspects identified in the criminal arrest warrants and were not making immigration arrests at the flea market.

Why weren't they making the arrests when they had illegals under their control and could identify them before they were permitted to leave an area under control of law enforcement? The guy had the primary piece of identification used by those without AMERICAN documents, and so further scrutiny was certainly warranted.

The answer, of course, is a failure of will when it comes to enforcing our American law. That failure starts at the top, in the Oval Office, and works its way down. It is why every state needs to enact Arizona-style laws -- if the federal government is unwilling or unable to control immigration, then the sovereign states need to take back their sovereign authority to do so on behalf of We the People.

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Houston, The Cattle Have Landed!

A lot of bloggers write about their lives and their home towns. I don't do that much -- call me boring or call me private -- I don't know which.

I'm going to do that a little bit right now.

I've mentioned that Johnson Space Center is just about five miles from my home, and that many of my friends (and at least one blogging nemesis) work for NASA and/or the companies that work with the space agency. But for all my fascination with the space program, I had not visited this local gem of national and international importance until last summer -- and I made only my second visit today, as a chaperone for a group of 11 & under kids from our church. It was an experience -- and I'm tuckered out.

But I did want to share my favorite photo of the day, and highlight one of those activities that goes on as a part of our community because of the manned space program is centered near the banks of Clear Lake here in southeaster Harris County.

Yeah, that is what you think it is -- and yes, it is located on the grounds of Johnson Space Center. And it is one of the most loved ways that NASA is involved in our local community. Kids in the local school district receive the opportunity to raise longhorn cattle on the grounds of the Johnson Space Center and show them at various livestock shows throughout the region. And these aren't just any old longhorns (not that there is really any such thing as "any old longhorn) -- they have been donated by some of the top breeders in the state. And so only a Vince Young (another prize-winning Longhorn) pass from one of the last remaining Saturn V rockets, I got to spend a few minutes visiting with this beautiful specimen and some fellow members of the NASA herd.

And no, I didn't use the zoom feature to take that picture and I have not done any editing except including the text and reducing the dimensions of the picture to a size that fit on my page -- I really was that close to that beautiful animal.

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Yeah, it's pretty cool how close you can get to the fence from the street by Rocket Park. I've gotten pretty close to some longhorns, since you *have* to go into the street to get a picture of the whole Saturn V building.

I'll admit I'm rather addicted to JSC -- I've been down there once or twice a year for the last four years. You might look at attending the SEEC conference in February (http://www.spacecenter.org/TeachersSEEC.html); in addition to some good ed. sessions, you also get the opportunity to go on some more behind-the-scenes tours of JSC.

July 23, 2010

The New Obama Theme Song

Seems to me that we have a replacement for "Hail to the Chief" for the remainder of the Obama presidency.

President Obama, who, along with his wife, has encouraged tourism in the Gulf Coast area since the massive oil spill, will take his family to the region for a weekend vacation next month.

The Obamas will travel to Florida on Aug. 14 for what is likely to be a hot, sticky visit.

No word yet on where they plan to stay.

* * *

In addition to the weekend in Florida, the Obamas have planned a two-week vacation in Martha's Vineyard, where they traveled last year.

For those of you not counting, that will be Vacation #4 and Vacation #5 since the beginning of the disaster in the Gulf caused by a leaking oil well approved and permitted by the Obama Administration for BP, which has given more money to Barack Obama than any other politician in the last two decades.

I wonder -- what happened to not resting until the oil was cleaned up and responsibility was determined?

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Shirley Sherrod: Dissent Equals Racism And A Desire To Return To Slavery

Well, folks, do you want proof that Shirley Sherrod is a malignant racist who really has not moved past the politics of racial division? Check out this performance with Anderson Cooper last night.

Here's the real kicker, commenting on Andrew Breitbart, found in the video starting at 2:32.

I think he would like to get us stuck back in the times of slavery. That's where I think he would like to see all black people end up again.

Got that? When it comes down to it, she is saying that Breitbart (and those of us who dare to agree with him) want a return to slavery if we disagree with the NAACP resolution on Tea Party racism, believe that the NAACP is chock full of racism itself, and dare to hold Shirley Sherrod to the same standard that the Left would hold a white man who admitted to having discriminated against a black or other racial minority, no matter how long ago it was. That, ladies and gentlemen, is not only absurd, but is de facto proof that she is still every bit the racist that she was 24 years ago when she didn't treat a white man equal to a black man because she found him to be uppity.

And I think that's why he's so vicious against a black president, you know. He would go after me. I don't think it was even the NAACP he was totally after. I think he was after a black president.

I wish that someone would tell this racist, race-baiting hate-monger that Barack Obama is not a black president. Barack Obama is the President of the United States, and that being the subject of harsh language and partisan attacks by one's opponents is a part of the job. That was the case with the holders of that office who happened to be white, and it still is the case when the holder of that office happens to be black. I said this in another context last year:

Barack Obama is President of the United States. He happens to be black. He is not the African-American President. We degrade the office, the man, and his accomplishments if we give Obama a special pass or special protection from certain criticism. . . that would be otherwise acceptable if directed against a President of another race.

I somehow don't think that Shirley Sherrod had a word to say about the Left when it was vicious against George W. Bush, a president who was a white man. She therefore has no legitimate basis to declare those who give Barack Obama the same sort of treatment to be racists simply because Barack Obama happens to have black skin. Indeed, there is a word for the position that she is taking here -- RACISM. So while one may choose to question the editing of the video of Sherrod's speech on Breitbart's website (and mine), her performance in the unedited video above does prove that she is, in fact, every bit the unreconstructed racist that she was when she decided to give second-class service to that white farmer nearly a quarter century ago.

By the way, I will point out one other thing -- at the beginning of the video, Sherrod makes the statement that she doesn't need an apology from Obama because he didn't make the decision to fire her, that other people in the White House did, and that they only told him about the decision after the deed had been accomplished. Now I realize that Barack Obama has a really busy schedule, with all that vacationing, golfing, and star-studded gala-ing, but he is ostensibly the person running the show in the administration that bears his name. Apparently, though, that is not the case, and he is merely a figurehead. So as an American who loves my country, I'd like to know -- who is in charge at the White House, doing the job that Barack Obama is apparently not doing?

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The best things about this Sherrod-Gate debacle are that it clearly demonstrates:

1) The Obozo administration screwed-up again (by ousting Sherrod without knowing all of the facts just as they did in the Cambridge Police GatesGate disaster)

2) Black racism towards whites

As for black racism, many people actually believe a black person cannot be prejudiced or racist because they are black. Accordingly, blacks typically get a pass on being racist, particularly when allowed to retract or modify such behavior or speech. On the other hand, whites are simply fired with no recourse.

This Would Stink

This may be the most unusual "what could go wrong with a wedding" story any one could have.

As Jessica Zabala was planning her dream wedding a year ago, she envisioned the sweet scent of tropical flowers wafting through the air with butterflies — not the stench of rotting flesh.

Yet now the young bride-to-be from Katy worries that her wedding set for Saturday evening in Houston's Cockrell Butterfly Center may smell more like a funeral.

That's because Zabala in her white gown will be competing for attention with another female - Lois, a rare corpse flower, who's been slowly revealing her burgundy attire to thousands of spectators daily. Unfortunately, the 5-foot bloom also emits a cadaver scent designed to attract carcass-eating beetles in its rain forest home in Sumatra.

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July 22, 2010

Great Viral Video -- I Am A Liberal

And where do these sentiments come from? Why the JournoList listserv that was frequented by so many prominent member of the lap-dog media. Could you imagine the horror and outrage if some conservative pundit or reporter expressed the desire to shove a liberal through a plate glass window, just because? Or if such an individual expressed a desire to stand and watch Keith Olbermann -- or barack Obama -- die at their feet? The fact that the expressions of political bias on JournoList were not exposed publicly in a contemporaneous fashion is grounds for the termination of every single journalist who was a member of that group. After all, it was not just unethical conduct -- it was news.

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Shirley Sherrod Peddles BS

"We've got to get beyond this [racial division]," she said. "... My message has been, 'Let's work together.' That's what my message has always been."

But how can that be reconciled with this?

"The first time I was faced with having to help a white farmer save his farm, he -- he took a long time talking, but he was trying to show me he was superior to me. I know what he was doing. . . . I was faced with having to help a white person save their land. So, I didn't give him the full force of what I could do. . . . So I took him to a white lawyer that we had . . . I figured if I take him to one of them that his own kind would take care of him."

Answer -- it can't. So quit trying to sell the "Saint Shirley" story. I'm not buying.

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July 21, 2010

One Of These Things Is Not Like the Other

Or so the Left and the lap-dog media would have you believe. Let's take a look and see if we can determine which one and why.

Scenario I"The first time I was faced with having to help a black farmer save his farm, he -- he took a long time talking, but he was trying to show me he was superior to me. I know what he was doing. . . . I was faced with having to help a black person save their land. So, I didn't give him the full force of what I could do. . . . So I took him to a black lawyer that we had . . . I figured if I take him to one of them that his own kind would take care of him."

Scenario II"The first time I was faced with having to help a Hispanic farmer save his farm, he -- he took a long time talking, but he was trying to show me he was superior to me. I know what he was doing. . . . I was faced with having to help a Hispanic person save their land. So, I didn't give him the full force of what I could do. . . . So I took him to a Hispanic lawyer that we had . . . I figured if I take him to one of them that his own kind would take care of him."

Scenario III"The first time I was faced with having to help a Jewish farmer save his farm, he -- he took a long time talking, but he was trying to show me he was superior to me. I know what he was doing. . . . I was faced with having to help a Jewish person save their land. So, I didn't give him the full force of what I could do. . . . So I took him to a Jewish lawyer that we had . . . I figured if I take him to one of them that his own kind would take care of him."

Scenario IV"The first time I was faced with having to help a white farmer save his farm, he -- he took a long time talking, but he was trying to show me he was superior to me. I know what he was doing. . . . I was faced with having to help a white person save their land. So, I didn't give him the full force of what I could do. . . . So I took him to a white lawyer that we had . . . I figured if I take him to one of them that his own kind would take care of him."

So, my friends, please tell me -- which of these things is different from the others?

The answer is, of course, obvious -- people with any sense of moral decency would declare the first three of these scenarios to be acts of out-and-out bigotry engaged in by bigots whose conduct would leave them unfit for any position of public trust, especially one working for the government, and that audience members giving approval to their conduct are racists who merit condemnation.

With regard to the fourth, various left-wing advocacy groups and members of the lap-dog media would declare that the speaker could not be racist because of her race, that the passage of time since the incident and the speaker's subsequent good works should absolve her of her guilt and that any members of her audience who expressed approval of her conduct in this instance were simply having an understandable reaction to the racial injustices that they and their people had experienced over the course of centuries.

"But wait," the morally decent people are no doubt asking. "What's the difference between the first three speakers and the fourth? Isn't the fourth speaker admitting the exact same sort of reprehensible attitudes and behavior as the first three? Isn't her audience just as despicably racist as the audiences of the first three speakers? Shouldn't we be judging these four scenarios by the same yardstick, considering the content of each speaker's character as revealed by their words, rather than the color of their skin?"

And my answer is that yes, we should judge all four speaker and their audiences using the same standard -- and that those who would excuse Shirley Sherrod and her audience while condemning the three white male speakers (who never spoke those words and whose pictures I pulled at random from around the web) have forfeited their right to ever point the finger at another to make an accusation of racism, for they are themselves every bit as bigoted as a kard-karrying Kluxer.

Now That The NAACP Has Released The Full Video

1) Given that the NAACP had the original tape, why did they pile on if what Shirley Sherrod said was really innocuous? Is it because they were too lazy to review the tape in their own possession? Or is it because they decided to reverse course only after the liberal lap-dog media decided to give Shirley Sherrod the victim treatment instead of the villain treatment they would have given a whit eman in the same situation?

2) Given that Ben Jealous was apparently present when the speech was made (see the video excerpt below at 45 second mark), why did Jealous need to review the tape and how could he have been “snookered” unless he is really incompetent?

July 20, 2010

In Re. Shirley Sherrod And The Accusation Of Racism

Looks like the Left has spent the day trying to turn Shirley Sherrod into a victim instead of the perpetrator of racial discrimination that she really is.

Shirley Sherrod, the department's ex-Georgia director of Rural Development, said the White House forced her out after the video surfaced showing her telling a story about how she withheld help to a white farmer in trouble. But she claimed the video omitted key context and that the administration just got scared.

"They were not interested in hearing the truth. No one wanted to hear the truth," she said in a television interview Tuesday morning.

I don't think she deserves an ounce of sympathy. We on the Right are simply applying to her the same standard that would have been applied by the Left and the lap-dog media to a white male GOP appointee who had confessed that he found a black citizen to be "uppity", that he therefore failed to give the black citizen all the help to which he was entitled, and that he then sent that black citizen to get help from "his own kind."

Especially imagine what would have happened if that hypothetical white male Republican were to have been addressing a Tea Party event and gotten the sort of support and affirmation from the audience for engaging in such discrimination as Sherrod did from her NAACP audience. It would have been set out as proof of racism within the Tea Party, just as this video clearly shows racism on the part of the attendees at the NAACP event.

No explanation would have been sufficient to justify the admission of racial discrimination. No partisan motive on the part of those who released the video would have been considered unacceptable. And there certainly would be no kid-glove interviews and media hand-wringing over how the speaker -- who admitted illegal racial discrimination -- was harmed by the disclosure. Indeed, the same liberal groups and media that are now expressing outrage at the release of the video have had no problem with using a broad brush to apply the racist label to the Tea Party movement and others who have dared dissent against the Obama agenda -- indeed, we've only today learned precisely how willing they are to do so falsely in the service of their liberal ideology.

Is it too bad that Shirley Sherrod gets hurt in this one? Maybe -- but she gets to be this years "Macaca Award" winner instead of the beneficiary of a Robert Byrd-style absolution. However, if the Left is going to insist upon casually playing the race card every time they feel slighted or threatened, then the time has come for those of us on the Right -- of all racial and ethnic backgrounds -- to begin to play it with a brutality and ferocity that will make the Left think twice before pulling it out this most incendiary of labels in any but the most egregious and indisputable cases of racial injustice. The Left chose this war; let them now face the consequences -- or concede their guilt in creating the worst racial climate of the last 40 years and forswear the abuse of the "racist" label right now.

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A Conspiracy Of Journalists

In March, 2008, my wife and I found ourselves staying in a hotel room near the Alabama/Mississippi border. When I returned to the room with our dinner, I discovered her intently watching Hannity & Colmes, something that was unusual for her in light of her general rejection of FoxNews.

What had her fascinated was a piece that had just come on, regarding Barack Obama's pastor and the inflammatory content of his sermons and writings. This was not the rubber-necking gawking of some right-wing Lookie-Lou -- it was the intent focus of a liberal woman with an M.Div. I'd seen it before as she critically watched the antics of televangelists tickling the ears of listeners and viewers with heterodox teachings that approach heresy. More to the point, it was the look of someone with ministerial standing in the same denomination as Jeremiah Wright, and who had served on national committees for that denomination. By the end of the report, she was thoroughly disgusted. She saw it as a potential game-changer in the contest for the Democrat nomination, and in the general election.

Apparently, so did a group of liberal journalists and commentators. Indeed, they were so concerned that they entered into a conspiracy to suppress the story and attack anyone in the media who dared to offer criticism of Jeremiah Wright, or who dared to seem to tie Barack Obama to the man who had been his pastor for two decades, who performed his marriage and baptized his children, and who he had described as his spiritual mentor and his friend.

The crisis reached a howling pitch in mid-April, 2008, at an ABC News debate moderated by Charlie Gibson and George Stephanopoulos. Gibson asked Obama why it had taken him so long – nearly a year since Wright’s remarks became public – to dissociate himself from them. Stephanopoulos asked, “Do you think Reverend Wright loves America as much as you do?”

Watching this all at home were members of Journolist, a listserv comprised of several hundred liberal journalists, as well as like-minded professors and activists. The tough questioning from the ABC anchors left many of them outraged. “George [Stephanopoulos],” fumed Richard Kim of the Nation, is “being a disgusting little rat snake.”

Others went further. According to records obtained by The Daily Caller, at several points during the 2008 presidential campaign a group of liberal journalists took radical steps to protect their favored candidate. Employees of news organizations including Time, Politico, the Huffington Post, the Baltimore Sun, the Guardian, Salon and the New Republic participated in outpourings of anger over how Obama had been treated in the media, and in some cases plotted to fix the damage.

Now I may be misinformed, but I thought that the role of journalists was to report the news, not take sides and attempt to suppress stories about favored candidates or repair damage that the reporting of such stories caused. But it actually went well-beyond that -- it went into the realm of character assassination of anyone who dared to raise the legitimate questions about the Obama/Wright connection.

In one instance, Spencer Ackerman of the Washington Independent urged his colleagues to deflect attention from Obama’s relationship with Wright by changing the subject. Pick one of Obama’s conservative critics, Ackerman wrote, “Fred Barnes, Karl Rove, who cares — and call them racists.”

"Who cares?" Well, perhaps only those interested in the truth, those who believe that baseless character assassination for political purposes is wrong, and those who believe that illegitimate use of the race card serves to delegitimize efforts to combat real racism. In other words, decent human beings care. Clearly Mr. Ackerman and his fellow members of the JournoList cannot be counted as members of any of those constituencies, given the discussions and activities that followed.

And make no mistake -- tehre was every effort to make sure that the Wright story was buried and stayed buried. For example there was this effort by Christopher Wright of The Nation.

Hayes urged his colleagues – especially the straight news reporters who were charged with covering the campaign in a neutral way – to bury the Wright scandal. “I’m not saying we should all rush en masse to defend Wright. If you don’t think he’s worthy of defense, don’t defend him! What I’m saying is that there is no earthly reason to use our various platforms to discuss what about Wright we find objectionable,” Hayes said.

Got that? There is certainly something objectionable about Wright -- but that doesn't mean we have to actually cover the story because of the damage it does to our preferred candidate and the assistance t gives to those whose politics and policies we oppose. So much for "the people's right to know" and "all the news that's fit to print", those venerable mottoes of the journalistic class -- they simply went out the window for members of the JournoList.

And let there be no doubt that the goal was nothing less than the journalistic lynching of political opponents, according to Ackerman.

What is necessary is to raise the cost on the right of going after the left. In other words, find a rightwinger’s [sic] and smash it through a plate-glass window. Take a snapshot of the bleeding mess and send it out in a Christmas card to let the right know that it needs to live in a state of constant fear.

In other words, this was to be nothing short of the MSM engaging in the "politics of personal destruction. And the tactics to be used were those that the Left routinely decries as "Red-baiting" and "McCarthyism". What's more, it is clear that the tactics proposed by Ackerman were explicitly adopted by many members of the MSM and their left-wing political allies.

And I think this threads the needle. If the right forces us all to either defend Wright or tear him down, no matter what we choose, we lose the game they’ve put upon us. Instead, take one of them — Fred Barnes, Karl Rove, who cares — and call them racists. Ask: why do they have such a deep-seated problem with a black politician who unites the country? What lurks behind those problems? This makes *them* sputter with rage, which in turn leads to overreaction and self-destruction.

And hasn't that been the precise methodology of many of these same members of JournoList and left-wing groups since before Obama's election? Hasn't any opposition to Obama's policies and proposals been defined as racism? Questions about the man's personal history, association with questionable figures, and qualifications have all been dismissed by the media as efforts to delegitimize Obama because of his race. Indeed, conservatives treating Obama the same way that presidents such as Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush were treated by the Left has been declared a sign of racial animus by those same leftists. and their allies in the press.

Frankly, the JournoList scandal (and yes, it is a scandal) is one that can and should shake the confidence of Americans in the mainstream media. Can the press -- especially the supposedly objected press like our daily newspapers and news magazines -- survive as a trusted institution so long as members of the JournoList are still employed by newspapers, magazines, and broadcast media? There needs to be a great blood-letting of JournoList members so that a new generation of reporters and commentators, who have learned the lessons of the unethical conduct of JournoList members, might restore the MSM to its proper role in our society.

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July 19, 2010

Another Tale Of Racism In The Obama Regime UPDATED: She Quits

If Shirley Sherrod is not fired within 72 hours, then funding for the USDA needs to be slashed -- and Barack Obama needs to be impeached for knowingly allowing racial discrimination to go unchecked within his administration.

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According to the Free Republic (http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2555545/posts), Sherrod was fired. According to Fox News (http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2010/07/19/clip-shows-usda-official-admitting-withheld-help-white-farmer/), she quit, but the quote from Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack leads the reader to believe that the resignation was forced.

Iranian Leader Calls Obama "Boy"

"We are for negotiations, but to do so you have to sit down like a good boy," Mr Ahmadinejad said, referring to the US in a speech broadcast live on state television.

This isn't some marginal wahoo with a sign standing on the edge of a larger rally that rejects his message -- this is the president of another country.

Will the NAACP remain silent? What about the American media? Or would highlighting this racial insult directed give Obama no political advantage and instead highlight that his outreach to Muslims and his efforts to make the world love America again have really been an EPIC FAIL?

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Obama Takes A Break From Golfing And Vacationing With A Star-Studded White House Gala

What happened to that promise not to rest until the BP situation in the Gulf was taken care of? I don't know -- this certainly seems like pretty restful.

Tony Award winners Nathan Lane, Audra McDonald, Tonya Pinkins and Marvin Hamlisch are part of "A Broadway Celebration: In Performance at the White House" July 19 in Washington, DC.

The Broadway-themed evening is presented as part of the White House's "In Performance" concert series. President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama host the 7 PM concert that will be filmed for an Oct. 20 broadcast on PBS.

The President is scheduled to introduce the evening that boasts performances by Lane (Guys & Dolls, The Addams Family), McDonald (Ragtime, Master Class), Pinkins (Caroline, or Change, Jelly's Last Jam) and songwriter Hamlisch (A Chorus Line, Sweet Smell of Success) as well as Idina Menzel (Wicked), Brian d'Arcy James (Next to Normal), Chad Kimball (Memphis) and Karen Olivo (West Side Story). Also performing is young actress Assata Alston and the Joy of Motion Dance Center ensemble.

Well, in the best spirit of Broadway, I'd like to offer this musical tribute that sums up the Obama presidency.

Nothing with kings, nothing with crowns;Bring on the lovers, liars and clowns!* * *Nothing with gods, nothing with fate;Weighty affairs will just have to wait!

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When Congress required most Americans to obtain health insurance or pay a penalty, Democrats denied that they were creating a new tax. But in court, the Obama administration and its allies now defend the requirement as an exercise of the government’s “power to lay and collect taxes.”

* * *

Administration officials say the tax argument is a linchpin of their legal case in defense of the health care overhaul and its individual mandate, now being challenged in court by more than 20 states and several private organizations.

Well, if the legislation is constitutional under the authority of the government to lay and collect taxes, that means that what we have here is massive new and/or increased taxes to pay for trillions of dollars in new federal spending -- and that middle and lower class Americans will be paying those taxes. It also means that Barack Obama and the Democrats have broken a key promise of the 2008 campaign. And what happened to the Commerce Clause argument? Is this an admission that the states suing to stop ObamaCare were right about that the Commerce Clause does not give government the ability to make Americans buy something they don't want?

But then again, isn't this broken promise just another "Change We Can Believe In" of the sort seen in the video below?

Just A Reminder Of Who Gets Left Out By The Elite

While I don't agree with some of the conclusions the author of the column draws, his recitation of who is advantaged and who is disadvantaged by affirmative action policies is spot-on.

Last year, two Princeton sociologists, Thomas Espenshade and Alexandria Walton Radford, published a book-length study of admissions and affirmative action at eight highly selective colleges and universities. Unsurprisingly, they found that the admissions process seemed to favor black and Hispanic applicants, while whites and Asians needed higher grades and SAT scores to get in. But what was striking, as Russell K. Nieli pointed out last week on the conservative Web site Minding the Campus, was which whites were most disadvantaged by the process: the downscale, the rural and the working-class.

This was particularly pronounced among the private colleges in the study. For minority applicants, the lower a family’s socioeconomic position, the more likely the student was to be admitted. For whites, though, it was the reverse. An upper-middle-class white applicant was three times more likely to be admitted than a lower-class white with similar qualifications.

This may be a money-saving tactic. In a footnote, Espenshade and Radford suggest that these institutions, conscious of their mandate to be multiethnic, may reserve their financial aid dollars “for students who will help them look good on their numbers of minority students,” leaving little room to admit financially strapped whites.

But cultural biases seem to be at work as well. Nieli highlights one of the study’s more remarkable findings: while most extracurricular activities increase your odds of admission to an elite school, holding a leadership role or winning awards in organizations like high school R.O.T.C., 4-H clubs and Future Farmers of America actually works against your chances. Consciously or unconsciously, the gatekeepers of elite education seem to incline against candidates who seem too stereotypically rural or right-wing or “Red America.”

In other words, the gatekeepers have made a choice to admit less-qualified black and Hispanic students over more qualified white and Asian students, as documented by measures such as grades and test scores. That isn't racial paranoia talking -- that is what the Ivy League researchers have found -- and we know that liberals insist that Ivy League professors are the ones we most need to listen to. And then, when picking white students, a second round of bias sets in -- those whose background is less urban, less liberal, and less affluent are also less likely to be admitted to these same schools. In other words, working-class whites from that great heartland of America derisively dismissed as "flyover country" by the white liberal elite are then dismissed in favor of those same elites when it comes to admission to elite institutions despite the now-documented fact that they are AS QUALIFIED as the children of the white liberal elite who are admitted and are MORE QUALIFIED than the average black or Hispanic student admitted to these same schools.

These schools say they want diversity -- when will they see that by rejecting students who are more likely to have grown up on a farm, more likely to come from a family where military service (more to the point, military service in the enlisted ranks) is a part of family tradition, and more likely to be Christian than the average white Ivy League student they also betray the very mission to foster diversity that they claim to have embraced? And if they will not do that, when will they admit that their diversity goals are not about bettering the education of their students, but are instead about nothing more than assuaging the guilt of wealthy white liberals on the backs of poorer white conservative students?

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July 17, 2010

Stilll Not Long Enough

As she represented terrorists on trial for the first World Trade Center attack, lawyer Lynn Stewart aided one of them in getting his messages and terror instructions tohisfollowersoutsideofprison.

A judge has resentenced a 70-year-old civil rights lawyer to 10 years in prison for letting a jailed Egyptian sheik communicate with his radical followers.

Federal Judge John Koeltl sentenced Lynne Stewart in Manhattan after she pleaded with him to reimpose the two-year, four-month sentence he had originally given her in 2006. She said she has been diminished since her November imprisonment.

An appeals court had ordered a new sentencing, saying the judge needed to consider whether she committed perjury.

Koeltl says she did and he says she lacked remorse after her first sentencing.

A pity that there was not the option of sentencing the treasonous, terrorism-supporting sack of crap to death -- but ten years is effectively life in prison for her, so I suppose there is that to be thankful for.

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This was her life, trying to destroy America. She was a committed socialist/communist (like Obama) who knew the fastest way to destroy our constitutional Republic was to aid our enemies. The sad part of this story is there are so many more just like her who are still working for our destruction and right now many of them are in the administration and the justice department.

Obama Dispatches First Dog Bo To Maine In Own Plane

Just keep repeating it to yourself -- "Democrats are the party of the ordinary people", "Democrats are the party of the ordinary people."

Arriving in a small jet before the Obamas was the first dog, Bo, a Portuguese water dog given as a present by the late U.S. Sen Ted Kennedy. . .

Got that, folks? In the midst of Obama's Great Dem-pression, We The People got to pay for a special plane to transport Obama's house pet to Maine. That's just how ordinary people do it, isn't it? Oh, that's right -- my dog had to stay behind in a kennel instead of flying on the taxpayer's dime last month. But then again, that is the key to the story -- since Barry Hussein is charging this whole thing to the taxpayers of the United States, he doesn't care how much it costs to fly his pampered pooch's private plane.

So you admit you were full of crap when you claimed he was "charging the whole thing to the taxpayers." Got it.

As to the planes, the entire contingent - Obama, family, staffers, media, dignitaries - flew in on two small Gulfstream jets. Or did you think he should have just flown in a half-empty Air Force One to New Hampshire (the nearest large runway) and motorcaded in? I'd say nice try on the meme, but really, it isn't. It's just plain stupid.

And I'd say nice try on the "no resting" strawman, but again, it's just stupid.

The New York Times spends a lot of time bashing the Catholic Church over sex abuse cases, many of them decades old, and has lately made a fetish of trying to tag the current pope as somehow responsible for failures to adequately address incidents in the past. Indeed, it took another shot at Rome in an editorial today.

The first woman ever elected as a Lutheran bishop said Friday that she had resigned from her post in northern Germany amid accusations that she failed to thoroughly investigate reports of a sexually abusive pastor. In a statement, Bishop Maria Jepsen, 65, said that questions about her credibility had led her to feel that she was no longer able “to spread the good word, as I vowed to do at my ordination.” She was elected bishop of the Lutheran church in northern Germany in 1992, the first woman worldwide to hold the post. She insisted that she could not recall being told of the abuse by a priest in the northern town of Ahrensburg. Hundreds of people claiming sexual and physical abuse of children by Protestant and Roman Catholic clergy have come forward in Germany since January.

Now the NY Times has given extensive coverage to those claims of abuse in Germany -- but only to the ones against Catholic clergy. One would be unaware of the claims against Protestant clergy, because the New York Times has failed to give them anywhere near the sort of play that is has the accusations against Catholics. And now a significant Protestant leader -- and one who is historic due to her being the first woman to ever hold the position of bishop among Lutherans -- has had to step down over her failures to address claims, and the new York Times cannot be bothered to devote more than a paragraph in a wire-service report to the story. This certainly seems to confirm the charges of anti-Catholicism that have been leveled against the paper for its coverage of clergy sex abuse over the years.

July 16, 2010

Something Stupid This Way Comes

Democratic Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee — who once famously asked where she could find photos of the American flag that Neil Armstrong planted on Mars — yesterday insisted, in stark defiance of basic facts of history, that “today we have two Vietnams, side by side, North and South, exchanging and working. We may not agree with all that North Vietnam is doing, but they are living in peace.”

Of course, therehasbeenonlyoneVietnamsince1975. I won't ever forget that, given that I was a 12-year-old on Guam who watched bewildered and frightened Vietnamese refugees carry their few possessions from planes on Guam following their evacuation ahead of the forces of a Communist regime that violated its agreements to end hostilities only 2 years before, and then spent the summer teaching English to my Vietnamese peers at St. John's School during our summer school program. Indeed, the latter experience is what first put me on the path to becoming a teacher.

I wonder what the Houston Vietnamese community has to say about Queen Shelia's ignorance.

On Sunday afternoon Representative Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Texas) was part of the panel for a legislative workshop titled “Engaging Congress: the NAACP’s Legislative Agenda to Achieve One Nation, One Dream”. Representative Jackson-Lee spoke on the tea party movement and immigration reform among other issues:

Representative Sheila Jackson Lee: ….And I thank you professor very much. I’m going to be engaging you with those very powerful numbers that you have offered on what the tea party recognizes, uh, or is recognized as. Might I add my own P.S.? All those who wore sheets a long time ago have now lifted them off and started wearing [applause], uh, clothing, uh, with a name, say, I am part of the tea party. Don’t you be fooled. [voices: "That's right.", applause] Those who used to wear sheets are now being able to walk down the aisle and speak as a patriot because you will not speak loudly about the lack of integrity of this movement. Don’t let anybody tell you that those who spit on us as we were walking to vote on a health care bill for all of America or those who said Congresswoman Jackson-Lee’s braids were too tight in her hair had anything to do with justice and equality and empowerment of the American people. Don’t let them fool you on that [applause]….

Unlessshehas incontrovertible evidence that the members of the Tea Party movement are, in fact, closet members of a paramilitary terrorist organization, she needs to be drummed out of Congress in disgrace.

Obama Thumbs His Nose At American Public Again

Most Americans oppose President Barack Obama’s ban on deepwater oil drilling in response to BP Plc’s Gulf of Mexico spill, even as they hold the company primarily responsible for the incident.

Almost three-fourths, or 73 percent, say a ban is unnecessary, calling the worst oil spill in U.S. history a “freak accident,” according to a Bloomberg National Poll. Barely more than a third say they support drilling less than they did a few months ago. The BP rig sank in April. The administration issued a new moratorium this week after a court rejected a six-month one imposed in May.

Clearly, this is not the change we've been waiting for. Seems to me that the change that the American people are waiting for will begin with the November elections.

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Corrupt Houston Pol Resigns

HISD trustee Diana Dávila said Wednesday she will resign from the school board Thursday, more than a year before her term ends.

Dávila, who was first elected to the school board in 2003, said she is stepping down because of "personal family issues."

* * *

She said her resignation is not related to the article in the Houston Chronicle on Sunday that said she had tried to appoint her husband to an Houston Independent School District committee that oversees a nearly $1 billion construction program, a move the district’s inspector general concluded was a conflict of interest.

I doubt Dávila would have accepted such a transparent lie from one of her students back during her days as a teacher. I know I won't accept this one from her.

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Some Observations On The Utah Illegal Immigrant List

I've hesitated to comment on the list of some 1300 alleged illegal immigrants that was circulated in Utah, because I had as many questions about it as I did answers. But as a bit more information has emerged, a couple of thoughts have formed about it that I'd like to share.

I'm concerned about how this information was obtained. The New York Times offers one scenario that I find troubling -- namely that the information was culled from state records that are, by law, confidential. If that is the case, then I have grave concerns about the illegal release of information. Indeed, I agree with the governor of Utah in this regard.

“Any release of private information of this nature, especially the depth and breadth of it, is concerning,” Ms. Welling said. “The governor wants to be sure that a state agency wasn’t involved, and if it was, to make sure it doesn’t happen again, and to get to the bottom of who was responsible."

However, it appears that some of these records indicate that government agencies are facilitating these immigration violations -- for example, since it appears that at least some of the information may have come from the State Department of Workforce Services, it appears that the state might be assisting individuals ineligible for employment in this country in illegally finding employment. Set aside that we are in the middle of the Mr. Obama's Recession and that this would mean that American citizens and aliens legally in this country might have been aced out of jobs by illegal aliens assisted in their job search by the state -- why is it that lawbreakers voluntarily disclosing information about their lack of legal immigration status to state officials are not reported to the federal government for removal from the country?

It appears that a number of the individuals on the list may be receiving government benefits of some sort. Why are they eligible for benefits if their very presence in the country is a violation of American law? And if they are receiving the benefits illegally, will Utah (or the federal government) take actions to recoup the benefits illegally obtained and prosecute the lawbreakers?

Of course, the article does indirectly make a point that many of us who wish to see our nation's borders secured and immigration laws enforced -- if the social and legal climate of the country is changed to make it uncomfortable for illegals to be in the country, they will self-deport.

Several people on the list expressed anxiety that their personal information had been released, and said they were concerned about their safety and that of their families. Some of those on the list said the heightened pressure could force them from the country.

One Guatemalan man, who spoke only on condition that he be identified as Monzon, admitted that he was in the country illegally.

* * *

But he struck a fatalistic note that might please the letter writers: “It might just be time to reflect and think if the time has come to leave,” he said.

Even if one accepts as a given that the information on that list was illegally obtained and agrees that those responsible for its dissemination therefore should and ought to face criminal sanctions, it is impossible to avoid the conclusion that coddling and compassion for Illegal aliens facilitates their illegal presence in this country and that a change in policy and practice is a necessary step to gaining control of the out-of-control immigration situation. Once we've done that, the time will be here for discussing necessary changes to our laws regarding who can come to the United States legally and how many such individuals will be admitted each year.

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Various ploys are used by bureaucrats to keep public information from the public. In reality all information gathered using tax payer funds should be available to the public. There may be a couple of exceptions but in general the government should not be allowed to keep secrets from the people.

Regarding "who" might have sent this information to law enforcement I believe it would fall under the whistle blower law. If our government had proof that some child molester was actively raping children but refused to use the information to stop the crime and prosecute the criminal we would all be incensed. Why aren't we incensed to discover that our government is complicit in this crime?

I have a friend who does taxes and regularly gets illegals filing for unearned income credits based on dependent children. It is common for them to use the same child for different adults and to claim multiple children using a child or two of their sisters or brothers to accomplish this fraud. When I told her she should turn them in she said she could not because her employer made her agree to not disclose anything she heard while processing tax returns. My question is if she heard about a murder would she stay quiet? How about another 9/11 attack? Where, exactly, to you decide which crimes to report and which ones you don't think are important?

Lack Of Competence, Or Lack Of Concern?

Yesterday, July 14, 2010, Barack Obama made his first appointment to a Federal court in the state of Texas. I won't comment on the nominee, Diana Saldaña, who has served for some time as a federal magistrate, since I do not have any particular knowledge of her character or qualifications that would lead me to presume her to be anything other than an acceptable candidate for a federal judgeship. Indeed, I would not comment on this at all but for a single line in the press release issued by Congressman Lloyd Doggett regarding the Saldaña nomination:

Yeah, that's right -- from the date that the recommendation was forwarded to the Justice Department, it took nearly a full year for a nomination to be made. Given that Judge Saldaña is a federal magistrate, she should not have been an unknown quantity to the Justice Department and her qualifications (or lack thereof) should have been easily discerned. So why the delay? Is this indicative of a lack of professionalism and competence in Eric Holder's Justice Department? Or is it a lack of seriousness on the part of Barack Obama when it comes to carrying out the constitutionally mandated duty to appoint judges to our nation's courts?

July 14, 2010

Left-Wing Commentator From Left-Wing Network Proves He Doesn't Get It

How do you figure your state out? It's pretty conservative obviously. It's Strom Thurmond country in many ways and, and it has people like DeMint pretty far over and then people like Lindsey Graham who are sort of regular conservatives. But then you nominated, your party has nominated an Indian-American woman, Nikki Haley. Obviously an attractive candidate, she knows how to present herself obviously, but what's that about? Is that just an interesting little aspect? "It's okay to be Indian-American but we got a problem with this black president?" What's that about?

Hey, Chris, you left out the fact that the GOP primary voters in South Carolina sent Strom Thurmond's son down to defeat in favor of a black man in a strongly Republican congressional district, too. But then again, that would have disrupted the narrative you were trying to construct, so you left that little detail out of your race-baiting question.

It obviously never occurred to you that opposition to Obama has little or nothing to do with the color of his skin and has a great deal to do with the content of his policies and ideology -- and that support for Nikki Haley and Tim Scott is predicated on their platforms, not their pigments. That speaks much more loudly about you and your ideological confreres than it does about conservative Republicans in South Carolina -- and those of us from the rest of the country who supported those two candidates with our money, our prayers, our voices, and out time during the primary campaign. We will continue to do so into the fall, in the hopes of seeing these candidates elected because of their message not their melanin.

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Obama Proves Himself Not Serious About War On Islamist Terrorists, To Stupid To Be President

In an interview earlier today with the South African Broadcasting Corporation to air in a few hours, President Obama disparaged al Qaeda and affiliated groups' willingness to kill Africans in a manner that White House aides say was an argument that the terrorist groups are racist.

Speaking about the Uganda bombings, the president said, "What you've seen in some of the statements that have been made by these terrorist organizations is that they do not regard African life as valuable in and of itself. They see it as a potential place where you can carry out ideological battles that kill innocents without regard to long-term consequences for their short-term tactical gains."

Andrew McCarthy demolishes this one quite effectively. You need to read the whole thing, but these two points show how the Obama Regime's obsession with racism (well, except for anti-white racism when expressed by Jeremiah Wright or the New Black Panther Party) has blocked out rational thought on the President's part about the real nature of the terrorist threat.

2. I think all this "hearts and minds" stuff is way overdone. But if I were a believer in it, I would say that it does us no good to make stupid arguments. Al Qaeda is not a racist organization, it is an Islamist organization. The goal of Islamism is to establish a global caliphate in which all people either convert to Islam or accept the authority of the Islamic state (and, as the Koran puts it in Sura 9:29, "pay the jizya with willing submission and feel themselves subdued"). Over the years, al Qaeda has shown itself willing to work with anyone who can be persuaded to support that goal — including Shiites, even though Sunnis actually do bear animus against them. Al Qaeda has never had any problem working with black people, whether in Africa, America, or anyplace else. The audience the administration is trying to reach knows that — better, apparently, than the administration does. So once again, our government ends up looking clueless.

3. Along the same lines, the president is either misstating or misunderstanding al Qaeda's argument. As Jen relates, Obama said (in reference to the Uganda bombings), "What you’ve seen in some of the statements that have been made by these terrorist organizations is that they do not regard African life as valuable in and of itself...." Well, of course they don't, but that has nothing to do with its being African life. Islamist groups (not just terrorist organizations but all Islamist entities) do not regard any kind of life other than one lived in accordance with sharia to be valuable in and of itself — they regard all other forms of life as an affront to Allah. They don't care about nations or continents; it's all about the umma, the global Muslim Nation. Ayatollah Khomeini famously said of his own country, "I say let this land [Iran] burn. I say let this land go up in smoke provided Islam emerges triumphant in the rest of the world." That's what al Qaeda means by deriding "African life," just like they deride every other kind of life besides sharia life.

I've always argued that no patriotic American could ever hope for Obama's removal from office because it would mean Joe Biden becoming president. This argument from Obama's mouth makes me doubt my own argument. After all, for all his buffoonery, Joe Biden at least seems to understand the nature of the enemy -- Barack Obama clearly does not. Unfortunately, incompetence is not grounds for impeachment.

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Obama Regime Tells 74% Of Americans They Don't Matter

Yeah, that's right -- 57% of Americans support the Arizona law, and another 17% think it does not go far enough. Seems to me that there is a broad public consensus in support of the law. On the other hand, only 23% of Americans side with the Obama Regime in opposing the law, which certainly seems to be acceptable under Supreme Court precedent on the matter.

According to the Supreme Court's most recent pre-emption ruling, Arizona's law is not pre-empted because Congress did not expressly prohibit state regulation of illegal aliens.

In fact, the Supreme Court has repeatedly rejected the pre-emption argument against state laws on immigrants -- including laws somewhat at odds with federal law, which the Arizona law is not.

In the seminal case, De Canas v. Bica (1976), the court held 8-0 that a California law prohibiting employers from hiring illegal immigrants was not pre-empted by federal law.

The court -– per Justice William Brennan -- said that the federal government's supremacy over immigration is strictly limited to: (1) a "determination of who should or should not be admitted into the country," and (2) "the conditions under which a legal entrant may remain."

So a state can't start issuing or revoking visas, but that's about all it can't do.

Manifestly, a state law about illegal immigrants has nothing to do with immigrants who enter legally or the condition of their staying here. Illegal aliens have neither been "admitted into the country" nor are they "legal entrants."

Indeed, as Brennan noted in the De Canas case, there's even "a line of cases that upheld certain discriminatory state treatment of aliens lawfully within the United States." (You might want to jot some of this down, Mr. Holder.)

So there's no "field pre-emption" of state laws dealing with aliens, nor is there an explicit statement from Congress pre-empting state regulation of aliens.

On top of that, the Supreme Court has repeatedly upheld state laws on immigrants in the face of pre-emption challenges. Arizona's law is no more pre-empted than the rest of them.

Seems to me that the "constitutional law professor" (actually a non-tenured adjunct lecturer) in the White House and his Attorney General ought to be familiar with such niceties as Supreme Court precedent on pre-emption, but that might be expecting a lot of the least qualified president of the United States since Millard Fillmore and his lackey at the Justice Department.

But then again, the best evidence that their entire argument against the Arizona law is a farce is the announcement that therearenoplansto file suit against sanctuary cities that are actively thwarting the enforcement of federal immigration law, even though their actions are pre-empted by the laws at which they thumb their noses. Arizona's offense, then is clearly that its people and its leaders want our nation's immigration laws enforced and borders secured -- something that Obama and his motley band of anti-Americans wish to prevent at all costs.

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Time For A Kathy Griffin Cancellation

How long would her show last if she had called Nancy Pelosi or Harry Reid's daughters "prostitutes"?

On her Bravo TV show Tuesday night, left-wing comedian Kathy Griffin referred to Sen. Scott Brown's two daughters as "prostitutes," and a CNN reporter apparently thought it hysterical.

Griffin, who was readying herself for a trip to Washington, DC to rally and drum up support for a repeal of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell," brought CNN reporters (husband and wife) Dana Bash and John King onto the show to "coach" her for handling Washington. Bash is a congressional correspondent for CNN, while King anchors the news hour "John King, USA."

When the couple showed Griffin a picture of Sen. Scott Brown and asked her to identify the figure, she responded "Scott Brown – who is a senator from Massachusetts, and has two daughters that are prostitutes."

But then again, families are only off-limits in politics if the politician is a Democrat -- the children of Republicans are fair game. Just ask the Palin kids.

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Obama Space Plan Rejected

Proving just how poor a leader Barack Obama really is, Senate DEMOCRATS have rejected his space plans. Their plan does the following:

• The bill basically extends shuttle for another year and keeps much of the Kennedy and Johnson Space Center shuttle workforces in place.

• It moves the project to design a heavy-lift vehicle (needed to get significant mass beyond low-Earth orbit) ahead, with an eye toward manned flights much earlier than 2025, as proposed by the President.

• It provides the money for operating the International Space Station through 2020.

• It provides almost as much for commercial space ventures as the President's proposal: an average of $1 billion a year over the next six years versus the President's $1.2 billion a year over five years.

It may not be the best plan possible, but it is a good place to start in negotiating with an administration that plans on gutting our nation's manned space program.

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Bill White Confirms Intention To Make Texas A "Sanctuary State" For Illegals

One more reason for loyal Americans to vote (albeit reluctantly) for Rick Perry.

“It would make our communities in Texas less safe, not more safe, if we took our local police officers and deputy sheriffs off the hard job of combating gangs and crime to do routine immigration work,” the former Houston mayor said.

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A missing Iranian researcher, whom Tehran claimed was abducted by the CIA, has taken refuge in the Pakistani Embassy in Washington, a senior U.S. official confirmed to CNN Tuesday.

"Iranian scientist Shahram Amiri, who was kidnapped by the Americans, had gone to the Pakistani Embassy in Washington, D.C. and taken refuge at Iran's Interest Section. He has requested to be sent back to Iran quickly," Iran's semi-official news agency Mehr said Tuesday.

Abdul Basit, a spokesman for the Pakistani foreign ministry, told CNN that Amiri arrived at the embassy at 6:30 p.m. Monday.

* * *

Amiri, a researcher at Tehran's Malek Ashtar University, mysteriously disappeared in June 2009 while on a religious pilgrimage to Saudi Arabia, according to Iranian media reports.

This does raise an interesting issue of the legality of such actions if Obama and his minions actually did participate in the kidnapping and imprisonment of Shahram Amiri. After all, this is not a case of a prisoner taken on the battlefield or a known terrorist. Can anybody say "high crimes and misdemeanors"?

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George Steinbrenner -- RIP

Whether you love or hate the Yankees, if you have even a passing acquaintance with baseball, you know George Steinbrenner. In an age when most professional sports owners have been drab, colorless business owners, he was one of the handful of exceptions to the rule. And his epic love-hate relationship with manager Billy Martin was at the heart of that public persona that eventually made him a media celebrity.

George Steinbrenner, who bought a declining Yankees team in 1973, promised to stay out of its daily affairs and then, in an often tumultuous reign, placed his formidable stamp on 7 World Series championship teams, 11 pennant winners and a sporting world powerhouse valued at perhaps $1.6 billion, died Tuesday morning. He was 80 and lived in Tampa, Fla.

“He was an incredible and charitable man,” the family said in a statement.

“He was a visionary and a giant in the world of sports. He took a great but struggling franchise and turned it into a champion again.”

George Steinbrenner has died -- and I cannot help but feel that the game of baseball is a little bit poorer for the loss of one of its more interesting characters. One only has to wonder how long The Boss will be in Heaven before he has fired God as manager and put the Heavenly Host in pinstripes.

The Dallas Morning News reports the use of the murders as a part of the advertising campaign, and then asks this question.

How do you feel about this campaign--do you support it or find it offensive to Muslims?

Frankly, I was stunned by the question, and it led me to leave the following comment to the article.

The question you ask is akin to asking "do you support the campaign against lynching or is it offensive to Klansmen?" Indeed, honor killings are nothing more than lynchings of women who are exercising their right to live as free and equal human beings, just as the lynchings of African-Americans in an earlier era were murders of individuals for exercising that same right.

Do I support the campaign against honor killings? Yes, i do. Do I think it offends Muslims? I hope so. And I hope it keeps offending them until the collective conscience of the Muslim community cries out "ENOUGH!" and brings an end to the dishonorable practice of killing girls and women for daring to be free instead of fearfully submitting to the backwards barbarism that Muslim men seem prepared to force upon them under threat of violence.

I've said it many times before -- most Muslims are good and decent people. There is, however, an ethic of violence that runs very deep within Islam and which is justified by authoritative readings of Islamic holy texts. Most Muslims do not act upon that call to violence in the name of Muhammad and Allah, but too many do, and there is often tacit support within the community when "good Muslims" act out that violence. That dynamic is a contemporary parallel of what went on in too many communities in this country when KKK violence was accepted as understandable and acceptable by "the best sort of people" even if they did not personally participate in it, and only by holding up the mirror to the ugliness was change able to begin. That is what is going on here, and campaigns like Geller's must be encouraged and supported as one step towards stopping this violence.

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The NY Times Condemns Honor Killings

But somehow leaves out a single important word on the subject.

The "Gray Lady" does take notice of the growing number of "honor killings" in which the honor of a family is redeemed through the murder of a girl or woman who dares to transgress the rules of proper behavior. The editorial begins with a story from India and then continues with the following.

. . . Prime Minister Manmohan Singh ordered a cabinet-level commission this month to consider tougher penalties in such cases. In June, India’s Supreme Court asked seven states and the national government to report on what is being done to address the problem. Mr. Singh and the court need to follow through.

Honor killings are widely reported in the Middle East and South Asia, but in recent years they also have taken place in Italy, Sweden, Brazil and Britain. According to Navi Pillay, the United Nations high commissioner for human rights, there are 5,000 instances annually when women and girls are shot, stoned, burned, buried alive, strangled, smothered and knifed to death by fathers, brothers, sons, uncles, even mothers in the name of preserving family “honor.” Ms. Pillay has rejected arguments that such family violence is outside the conceptual framework of international human rights.

There is a reason these religious and cultural beliefs are allowed to persist. Politicians don’t have the courage to call it what it is: murder.

What is interesting to note is that the "honor killing" used as an example is that of a Hindu woman committed by her Hindu family. What is ignored is that the vast majority of these murders in the Middle east and South Asia are committed by Muslims -- and that they have spread not only to "Italy, Sweden, Brazil and Britain", but also to the United States, in places like Arizona, Texas, and Buffalo, NY. These honor killings were committed by Muslim men (often with the consent and participation of the victim's own mother) against wives, sisters, and daughters who dared to commit grievous offenses like wearing American clothes, dating American boys, and seeking to escape physically and psychological abuse at the hands of their tradition-oriented Muslim families. In other words, their offense was wanting to be free and equal -- something that the Islamic culture of their families would not allow.

As noted by Phyllis Chesler, "according to my 2010 study in Middle East Quarterly, 84% of those who commit honor murders in North America have been Muslims and 96% of honor murderers in Europe were Muslims." In other words, the problem seems to be one with Islam.

It is good that the New York Times has come out against the backwards, barbaric practice of honor killing in foreign lands. Now wouldn't it be great for them to notice such murders in our midst -- and what group is committing more of them than any other?

Advancing on a constituent and slamming the table like he was going to become physically violent? Especially when his target was a seated woman? Seems like an over-reaction to me. But it does lead one to ask --would Ciro Rodriguez have had the cojones to act that way with a male constituent, or is he merely a cabrón who likes to push around women?

Switzerland Delares Itself A Haven For Violent Child Rapists

The Swiss Ministry of Justice has decided not to extradite film director Roman Polanski to the United States, Reuters and the Associated Press report.

The film director has been held in Switzerland since last September on an extradition request made by U.S. authorities for a 1977 sex case.

I have mixed emotions on this one. Part of me would like to see a "snatch-and-grab" operation drag Polanski back to this country for justice. On the other hand, perhaps the better alternative is to simply hand ever registered sex offender a passport and a plane ticket to Geneva with orders not to come back -- and then revoke the passports upon their setting foot on Swiss soil.

This documentary is about the disenfranchising of American citizens by the Democratic Party and the Obama Campaign. We the People have made this film. Democrats have sent in their stories from all parts of America. We want to be heard and let the country know how our party has sanctioned the actions of what we feel are Obama Campaign "Chicago Machine" dirty politics. We believe this infamous campaign of "change" from Chicago encouraged and created an army to steal caucus packets, falsify documents, change results, allow unregistered people to vote, scare and intimidate Hillary supporters, stalk them, threaten them, lock them out of their polling places, silence their voices and stop their right to vote, which is, of course, all documented in "We Will Not Be Silenced."

"We Will Not Be Silenced" is about the people who fight back by simply telling their stories: Teachers, professors, civil rights activists, lawyers, janitors, physicists, ophthalmologists, accountants, mathematicians, retirees - all bound together by their love of America and Democracy. They will tell us their experiences and how they feel betrayed by their own party. They will discuss how their party has disenfranchised them and how, when they saw and reported multiple instances of fraud, everyone turned a blind eye. Rather than support and protect the voices and votes of its loyal members, the DNC chose to sweep this under the rug by looking the other way, or using ceremony and quasi-investigations to assuage angry voters. It is our opinion there never before has been such a "dirty" campaign; the campaign that has broken the hearts and spirits of American voters, who once believed in the Democractic voting system.

Will the information in this documentary result in federal investigations and criminal charges? No, it won't -- as we have seen of late, any electoral shenanigans in favor of Obama in 2008 or engaged in by minorities will not be investigated or charged by the Obama Regime and the Eric Holder-run Department of Injustice.

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July 11, 2010

More Eric Holder Incompetence

Attorney General Eric Holder raised questions Sunday about whether it would be possible to impose the death penalty on Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed if he were to plead guilty before a military commission.

Holder proposed last year trying Mohammed and four alleged accomplices in civilian courts in New York City. But that idea generated so much controversy that it’s all but been abandoned.

He told CBS’ “Face the Nation” that it’s possible to impose the death penalty in a civilian setting for someone who pleads guilty. But he says there’s far less legal certainty about that possibility in a military setting.

What the hell is this MORON talking about? Capital punishment following military trials has long been permitted -- for both Americans and foreign combatants. If I, a mere high school teacher know that, why the hell doesn't the Attorney General of the United States?

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Like What, Mr. Holder?

That is what ought to be the next question from any reporter who isn't down on his or her knees fellating an Obama Regime official after a statement likethis.

In an exclusive interview with CBS News chief Washington correspondent Bob Schieffer on CBS' "Face the Nation," Attorney General Eric Holder said the Justice Department is challenging Arizona's controversial new immigration law in court because it is inconsistent with, and is preempted by, federal law.

"What we're saying is that they cannot pass laws that are inconsistent with the federal laws, or do things that contravene federal policy when it comes to the enforcement of our immigration laws," Holder said. "And the Arizona statute, if you look at the guts of it, really puts in place a whole variety of things that are inconsistent with what we have decided to do as a federal government."

The Arizona law in question makes it a state crime for a person to be in the country illegally. It requires local law enforcement during all "lawful stops" to question a person about his or her immigration status if there is "reasonable suspicion" that person may be in the country illegally. Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer called the federal suit against the law "outrageous" and has vowed to fight it.

Well, you schmuck, what in the Arizona statute is inconsistent federal law? Specifics, please, not vague generalities that tell the American people nothing. Or what federal policies regarding enforcement of federal immigration laws does it contravene? Again, specifics please. And why are you not taking identical actions against other states that have similar laws on the books or that have already begun carrying out similar policies to those you claim violate federal law or policy? Also, what actions are you taking against sanctuary cities who have enacted laws or policies that are contrary to federal law? Why the selective outrage against Arizona -- could it be that it is the home state of Obama's 2008 opponent and a state unlikely to give its electoral votes to Obama in 2012 or elect a Democrat Senator in 2010, meaning that it can be a target in a way that states that might be electorally beneficial to the president and his party cannot be?

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How Low Can Obama's Popularity Go?

Pres. Obama is the best fundraiser the Dem Party has, but his drawing power is way down from its peak during the ’08 campaign.

Obama is heading to MO and NV today to raise money for Sec/State Robin Carnahan (D), running for an open Senate seat, and Senate Maj. Leader Harry Reid.

But Carnahan’s campaign wasn’t able to completely sell out the Folly Theater, where Obama will appear for a grassroots event on Carnahan’s behalf, at the prices they wanted. Tickets once priced at $250 are now going for $99, while $35 tickets are half off.

Half off tickets for a presidential event -- or even more for the good seats. That, my friends, is but one more indication that Barack Obama is an EPIC FAILURE. Either that or people from KC are racists -- or they don't trust him because his middle name is Hussein, or they hate America, or. . .

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July 09, 2010

Call This A Poor Choice Of How To Begin Your Marriage

Call him the officiator-in-chief: Former President Bill Clinton will preside at the wedding of New York Rep. Anthony Weiner to a longtime aide of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

That's according to people familiar with the ceremony. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss it. Aides to Weiner and the former president declined to comment.

The 45-year-old congressman and his 34-year-old fiancee, Huma Abedin, are to be married Saturday at the Oheka Castle in Huntington on Long Island.

Bill Clinton presiding over a wedding is like Lorena Bobbitt presiding over a bris.

Leave This Business Alone!

Sajid Master wants the phone calls and angry letters to stop. He wants people to quit coming into Perfume Planet in west Houston to yell at his workers. He'd especially like folks to stop castigating his landlord.

Nearly a year after the Internet painted Master as an Al Qaida sympathizer, outrage toward the store at the Harwin Central Mart shows no sign of waning.

"They've threatened to kill me; sometimes they're cursing when they call," a resigned Master said Thursday in his shop.

Trouble is, all the indignation is the product of a massive misunderstanding, illustrating the awesome — and sometimes damaging - power of the Internet.

Master, who describes himself as a proud American citizen, isn't a terrorist sympathizer. He's just a shopkeeper who inadvertently touched a very raw nerve.

It started when the Muslim merchant posted a sign at his shop during Ramadan explaining the store would be closed Sept. 11 to remember the death of Imam Ali, a sacred Muslim figure. Master failed, however, to explain that Ali, who is remembered on a different date each year during Ramadan, died in 661 A.D. and was in no way related to the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

Someone snapped a picture of the sign and started sending it around online, claiming Imam Ali was one of the Sept. 11 hijackers.

Before long the photo went viral, showing up on countless conservative Internet forums and prompting statements like this one that appeared at 2Aforum.com: "Picket, protest, and through lawful means, strangle their business."

Soon the phone calls started, befuddling and overwhelming store manager Hasan Kolsawala, who tried to explain that no offense was intended.

When I first saw the picture and saw the email referred to in this article, I shrugged it off because I knew enough Islamic history to recognize exactly what event was being marked and knew that the lunar calendar followed in Islam makes this particular holy day a movable feast -- much like Jewish holy days shift and change under the Jewish calendar. The explanation in this article is legitimate, and the owner of the shop did nothing wrong by closing the shop or placing the sign. I even pointed that out on a couple of blogs at the time, and in comments on a couple of news articles I saw on the internet. Unfortunately, the story has not died down, and this man still suffers consequences from the ignorant (or perhaps malicious) actions of others.

Now most folks who read this blog know I am not a fan of many things in Islam. However, I recognize that many, indeed most, Muslims in this country are decent people who practice the religion peacefully, as is our First Amendment permits.

By all accounts, Sajid Master is one of those decent people. As such, I urge people to leave him and his business in peace -- he is peacefully practicing his religion like so many other Americans of all faiths do. And I'll take it a step further. My wife has been wanting to do some shopping at the fashion shops in the Harwin area -- I'm going to make a point of stopping in at Perfume Planet to make a purchase. I urge others in the Houston area to do the same.

A member of the Muslim community is suspected of setting the fire that occurred at a Marietta mosque Monday night, Marietta fire officials said Thursday.

Tamsir Mendy, 26, a native of Gambia, has been charged with 1st degree arson and is being held without bail at the Cobb County detention center, said Scott Tucker, Marietta assistant fire chief.

Firefighters got the call about 11:30 p.m. Monday night that the Islamic Center of Marietta (Masjid Al-Hedaya) was on fire. When they arrived at the mosque at 968 Powder Springs St., flames were coming from the front and back of the converted house. Firefighters saved the structure, but damages to the facility are estimated at about $100,000, Tucker said.

Mosque leaders said Mendy, who describes himself as a “devout Muslim,” had attended their prayer services for a few weeks, Tucker said.

Mendy was taken into custody around 5:30 p.m.

Just one of those things, I guess -- another fake hate crime to stir up suspicion of those who do not follow Islam and who dare to point to the connection between that faith and acts of terrorism.

When Lanny Davis drops an op-ed, there tends to be more to it. So we should take note that he’s got Democrats signing onto a plan to tax your ATM withdrawals.

Why, you ask? Well, to pay down the deficit.

Rep. Chaka Fattah (D-Pa.) has introduced Davis’s dream legislation. It would charge a penny for every dollar of your money drawn from an ATM machine. That would then beg the question — why put your money in a bank if you are going to get taxed merely for the right to access your money.

So much for no new taxes on anyone making less than $250K a year!

Just remember, folks -- it isn't your money. It is the government's money. They are just permitting you to keep it in your name and to use some of it for your own purposes. Any time they want to take more of it from you, that is their prerogative -- after all, you don;t really own anything in the dream world of the Obamunists!

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A classic ploy. This idea is so offensive no one will allow it. Instead they will feel good about convincing the government to "settle" for a national sales tax instead. That is the holy grail! A national sales tax. Cal it what you will but that is what the Dems are after. They will borrow, tax and spend us into bankruptcy and the only solution to the crisis is a "small" sales tax. LOL In fact I will bet anyone right now when they tell us they are going to give us a sales tax they will make some guarantees/promises that it will never be higher then 1% or 2% or 5% or whatever they think we will swallow. I'm pretty sure they won't use the term "lockbox" but something new and sexy to reassure us they mean us no harm.

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Mexico Breaks Up Hezbollah Network In Tijuana

Mexico foiled an attempt by Hezbollah to establish a network in South America, a Kuwaiti newspaper reported on Tuesday.

Hezbollah operatives employed Mexicans nationals with family ties to Lebanon to set up the network, designed to target Israel and the West, the Al-Seyassah daily said.

According to the report, Mexican police mounted a surveillance operation on the group's leader, Jameel Nasr, who traveled frequently to Lebanon to receive information and instructions from Hezbollah commanders there.

And for those of you unaware of where Tijuana is, here's a map.

Got that, folks -- Hezbollah in Tijuana, Mexico, where there are 300,000 LEGAL border crossing daily (and God only knows how many illegal border crossings). Seems to me that we need to step up our border security if the terrorists are that close, and quit pretending that the porous southern border is not an issue of grave national importance.

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An Interesting Question On Obama's Citizenship

Now I have said time and again that I believe that Barack Obama was born in the United States and is a natural born citizen. I believe that today, and have yet to see even a scrap of evidence to convince me otherwise. However, this situation in the state of Missouri raises an interesting question -- one that cries out for some further clarification -- because of the apparent racial/partisan double standard being applied by a Democrat election official.

Hector Maldonado is a naturalized American citizen born in Mexico. he is a US Army veteran. He is running for the GOP Senate nomination in Missouri, where he trails Congressman Roy Blunt by a wide margin. But Maldonado raised an issue recently that needs to be brought to light much more fully in the national media. It involves a letter he received from the Missouri Secretary of State, Robin Carnahan, pursuant to his filing as a candidate for office.

MALDONALDO: [Secretary of State Robin Carnahan] sent me a letter, and I ignored, it said, you have to prove you’re a citizen. I ignored it. You know, Obama got away with it, so I figured I could get away with it too. … I brought all this documentation…and I asked, is that a public record, now? … And they said, oh yes, absolutely, anyone who wants proof, we have it. I said, okay, can you do me a favor then, I’m sure Ms. Carnahan requested the same of Barack Obama when he petitioned to get on the Missiouri’s ballot to become president. They had no response, nothing.

I was going to picket when Mr. Obama coming into town to raise money for Ms. Carnahan. And I was going to…put up a big sign, telepromter, ‘read here Mr. Obama, Ms. Carnahan, where’s his proof of U.S. citizenship?‘ But I decided something different. I’m actually considering suing Ms. Robin Carnahan, because she discriminated against me. And she actually has said her job is to protect Missouri against fraud and corruption, but the fraud that she created is if she did not make Mr. Obama show proof of citizenship when he petitioned to get on the Missouri ballot. So therefore, the votes that he got from Missouri…should be taken back. And hopefully, other states do the same thing and sue Ms. Carnahan and their other secretaries of states, and sooner or later he’s going to have to prove, based on our demand, that he is in fact a U.S. born citizen.

Now let's consider this for just a minute. The Secretary of State in Missouri is requiring proof of citizenship from candidates for federal office. The documents filed to prove citizenship are a public record. And yet there is on file in Missouri NO PROOF OF US CITZENSHIP for Barack Obama. We know this because Hector Maldonado made a request for such proof when he filed his own proof of citizenship as per Secretary Carnahan's official demand that he prove his citizenship or be removed from the Missouri ballot.

This leads to some questions:

On what legal authority is Missouri Secretary of State Robin Carnahan demanding proof of citizenship from candidates for federal office seeking ballot access in Missouri?

Did Carnahan make such a demand of Barack Obama prior to allowing him on the ballot in 2008?

Was documentary evidence produced by Barack Obama proving his citizenship? What form did that evidence take?

If no documentary evidence was produced, why was Barack Obama permitted to be a candidate on the ballot in the 2008 Democrat primary and the 2008 general election in Missouri?

If such evidence was produced, why was it not made available to Hector Maldonado as a public record when it was requested?

If no request for proof of citizenship was made of Barack Obama, why was a request for such proof made of Hector Maldonado? Is the reason his party affiliation? Or is the reason racial/ethnic profiling against a Hispanic?

If there is a requirement in Missouri that a candidate for federal office tender proof of citizenship and Obama did not do so, were votes cast for him legally invalid?

Those are not "Birther" questions, contrary to claims by at leastone left-wing website. They are "Equal Protection of the Law" questions. After all, we have two candidates for federal office being treated differently by the same public official acting under color of law. We need an explanation for that disparate treatment in order to determine whether or not the US Constitution, Missouri Constitution, and US and Missouri law are being violated by Robin Carnahan and her office.

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July 07, 2010

Sadly, Golda Meir's Vision Still Has Not Been Achieved

Golda Meir, one of the greatest women of my lifetime, is often quoted as having said the following.

“We will have peace with the Arabs when they love their children more than they hate us”

Sadly, they still don't, as witnessed by this quote from a Palestinian mother whose desperately ill child was saved through the skill of Israeli physicians and the generosity of Israeli Jews who donated money for his treatment.

"Life is not precious. Life is precious, but not for us. For us, life is nothing, not worth a thing. That is why we have so many suicide bombers. They are not afraid of death. None of us, not even the children, are afraid of death. It is natural for us. After Mohammed gets well, I will certainly want him to be a shahid. If it's for Jerusalem, then there's no problem. For you it is hard, I know; with us, there are cries of rejoicing and happiness when someone falls as a shahid. For us a shahid is a tremendous thing."

Sadly, this is an attitude that is all too common among the Palestinians, whose children collect trading cards of homicidal terrorists like American children collect football and baseball cards. There can be no peace as long as such a situation exists, and as long as that attitude is prevalent in Gaza and the West Bank. Jew-hatred is a way of life and a cultural imperative for these people, and even the best-intentioned efforts towards what their supporters call peace are doomed to failure so long as that attitude remains as the dominant one among the Palestinians. As such, any support for the Palestinians becomes nothing less than support for Jew-hatred and genocide against the Jewish people -- and for hatred against and murder of the rest of us who refuse to bow down before a religion with a name that means "submission", not "peace".

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I Wondered if This Was The Case

Helping ease fears that a wave of spilled crude is heading this way, Coast Guard investigators said Tuesday they have identified five vessels they believe may have carried tar balls from BP’s gushing oil well off Louisiana to Galveston and other parts of the Texas coast.

The vessels, including three barges and two boats, were part of the armada assisting BP at the well site and are now being inspected to determine whether they were indeed the source, Coast Guard officials said.

While officials have not ruled out the possibility that ocean currents pushed the clumps of crude to the Texas shore, “the weathering of the oil was not consistent with oil that had made the trip of nearly 400 miles,” retired Coast Guard Adm. Thad Allen said Tuesday at a briefing in Houston.

Given that tar balls are already a common phenomenon on some Texas beaches, I didn't figure that this was the first coming of the BP leak. After all, there are lots of sources out there for the phenomenon -- and we are not even sure if the oil that created the tar balls is from the gusher off Louisiana. So while we cannot be complacent, we ought not rush to conclusions without the evidence to support them.

“The federal government’s legal case turns on the question of pre-emption — the notion that only Washington has the authority to set immigration policy. The Justice Department’s complaint says that Arizona’s statute, which Republican Gov. Jan Brewer signed in April, “is preempted by federal law and therefore violates the Supremacy Clause of the United States Constitution.”

Enforcement of immigration law might seem like a natural area for federal law to take precedence. “Very quickly, we would end up with 50 states with 50 different types of immigration law,” says Ali Noorani, executive director of the National Immigration Forum, an immigrant advocacy organization. “To avoid that catastrophe, the Obama administration has stepped in and said there’s one immigration law, and that’s the federal law.”

But in recent years states have passed hundreds of laws addressing immigration — laws that survived earlier court challenges raising pre-emption concerns. And the Arizona statute was crafted specifically with this constitutional question in mind. Some of its most contentious language was derived directly from existing federal laws.

“What the federal government might have to argue, in effect, is that it is not [its] policy to enforce federal immigration law,” says Steven Camarota, director of research at the Center for Immigration Studies, which favors stricter enforcement of immigration laws. “They would be on stronger ground saying that Arizona is doing something contrary to the policy of the federal government.”

Fine, they claim that federal law preempts state law on this matter, even though federal efforts to enforce its statutes are fleeting, fickle, and failed. They argue that the actions of the state to protect its people are prohibited. Hence the Feds are joining with a foreign government, advocates of the dismemberment of the United States, and border-jumping immigration criminals themselves to make sure that the state of Arizona does not take effective action with regard to illegal immigration. What about the obligation to protect states from invasion? Why is that obligation being abrogated by Obama and his minions?

So to Obama, Holder, Napolitano, and the rest, I say this -- if you reallybelievethatyourweakenforcement of a toothless statute allows you to preempt a state from imposing identical requirements and regulations under state law, then EMPT, damn it! If your prior actions are a grounds for preventing Arizona's actions, then you must act -- or get out of the way. And if you will not do so, you implicitly concede that the federal government lacks legitimacy today because it lacks the potency to carry out its essential functions -- at which point, Arizona needs to simply ignore the Obama Regime and any federal court ruling on its behalf. At that point, it will be necessary for you to decide if you will use the power of a feral Federal Government to do to the people and elected officials of one of our nation's 50 sovereign states what you will not do to a foreign government and its citizens as they violate both state and national sovereignty at will.

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July 05, 2010

An Observation On Christian Legal Society v. Martinez

Over at the First Amendment Center, Charles Haynes notes the following problem with the decision in CLS v. Martinez.

Beyond the setback for religious freedom, the Court’s decision is a body-blow to freedom of association. Public universities around the nation will likely rush to draft their own version of the “all-comers” policy, leaving student groups organized around shared beliefs little choice but to accept members and leaders who reject those beliefs — or lose access to benefits.

As Alito put it, the decision “arms public educational institutions with a handy weapon for suppressing the speech of unpopular groups — groups to which, as Hastings candidly puts it, these institutions ‘do not wish to … lend their name(s).’”

Not only is the policy imposed by UC-Hastings absurd, but it also leaves open other questions. For example, what does it require to meet the burden of proving "open membership"? Will it require some statistical demonstration of inclusiveness? And what of the issue of leadership -- is a group sufficiently inclusive if it merely allows non-conformists to run but never actually elects them to office? Will the next requirement be that student organizations affirmatively seek out dissenting members, and reserve a percentage of their leadership positions for those non-conforming members? In other words, will we see public institutions of higher education imposing the same sort of scheme of quotas on their student groups that they have attempted to justify in admissions for years based upon the value of "diversity"? After all, the majority in this case held that the "all-comers" policy was acceptable if applied to all organizations -- why not a mandatory affirmative action policy?

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Is NASA Administrator Bolden Corrupt?

It is a question that needs to be asked -- and which I'm surprised that Houston media and NASA-connected bloggers here in the Houston area have not beenaskingthequestions.

While millions of barrels of spilled oil choke the Gulf of Mexico, NASA is working on an ocean-based biofuels venture that could revolutionize clean-energy production at sea and treat wastewater at the same time.

The scientist running the $10 million experiment, called Project OMEGA, uses words such as groundbreaking and exciting to describe his baby. But there's a hitch.

NASA Administrator Charlie Bolden doesn't believe in OMEGA — and has sought to slow it down.

The reason: He was advised against it by Marathon Oil — the Texas-based company on whose board Bolden sat until he was named NASA administrator last year. The former astronaut and Marine Corps general also still holds as much as $1 million worth of Marathon stock.

Why didn't this story make waves here in Houston? Where was the local blogging community on this one, and the local media? Have the fears of NASA budget cuts cowed the local NASA watchdogs -- especially those who work for the space agency? Or is it because of partisan sympathy for the Obama Administration and a desire not to raise another ethical scandal about another appointee of this presidential failure?

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NY Times Argues For All Deliberate Speed, Massive Resistance

Is it the job of the Supreme Court to interpret the Constitution correctly in order to protect the people's liberties, or is it to move slowly so as not to upset the status quo? According to the New York Times, it is the latter.

We do not argue that precedent must be worshiped and upheld at all costs. If that were the case, as Justice Roberts noted, segregation would still be legal and minimum-wage laws unconstitutional. But when the Brown v. Board of Education decision in 1954 overturned Plessy v. Ferguson from 1896 and outlawed segregation, it came after many years of relentless legal efforts against Jim Crow by Thurgood Marshall and many others. It was clear that the legal landscape was changing.

Yes, it was clear that the landscape was changing. But the change took more than a generation despite the fact that Plessy was manifestly wrong -- and the overturning of Plessy was accompanied with the dictate to move with "all deliberate speed" -- meaning that it was couple decades before many of the rights in question were meaningfully vindicated after Brown as those with a vested interest in maintaining the racist status quo through a strategy of "massive resistance" to change. In the eyes of today's New York Times editorial board, those massive resisters ought now be looked upon as heroes rather than villains because of their dedication to predictability, stability, and judicial modesty and the judges who properly interpreted the Constitution as villains.

So never mind that there are rights clearly protected by the Constitution that were given short shrift by legislators and an earlier generation of jurists. never mind that the First Amendment is there precisely to protect political speech and the Second Amendment to protect the right of citizens to keep and bear arms. Better that generations more be denied the full exercise of those rights in the interest of slow, predictable change -- and the editors of the New York Times have made it clear that they believe that those who think otherwise most assuredly need to know their place and move to the back of the bus.

July 04, 2010

Who Could Have Predicted Something Like This?

A NINE-year-old girl was molested during a family day at a specialsed prison for sex offenders, it has emerged.

The incident occurred last month when the department hosted the event - where family members visit incarcerated sex offenders - at the Adult Diagnostic and Treatment Centre in Avenel, New Jersey.

New Jersey's Department of Corrections is investigating the incident, The Star-Ledger reported.

Authorities filed disciplinary charges against convicted sex offender Claudio Gonzalez for allegedly touching the niece of another inmate during the family day, attended by 116 children and 418 adult relatives, who mingled with 30 supervising officers.

Words absolutely fail me on this one.

Kids.

Sex offenders.

Together.

Socializing.

Whose STUPID idea was this?

And have they been terminated from their employment not that this matter has come to light?

Still, I believe it is fair for me to edit the comment in question that way -- by injecting race into his discussion of the qualifications of a candidate for public office, John is playing the most offensive sort of racist politics out there. Indeed, this is precisely the sort of racial politics that Barack Obama SAID he was opposed to.

Is Anybody There?

Independence was not a foregone conclusion at the start of what we today call the American Revolution. It took the work of a persistent handfull, notably John Adams, to get the Continental Congress to pass a resolution for independence, commission the Declaration, and then adopt an edited form of Jefferson's work.

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Hey, I thought of that first!! *grin* Have a glorious and happy Fourth! And yes, there are a few of us who "are there", and "do care". We are waiting for the cards to fall. For the last possible proper actions to be taken from with in the system (such as it still is). But come Nov 6th (or there about) if the voice of the people is well and truly silenced ... then it will be time to pick up the gauntlet so cavalierly tossed, and answer the challenge just like our forefathers did 234 years ago.

As for the musical "1776", went to see it when the production was playing in Chicago (live theater, not the movie), with our high school music department. Would have loved playing the part of John Adams had we done the production before I graduated in '73.

Have always liked that particular "musical piece". And find it quite stirring.

July 03, 2010

Since When Is This The Purpose Of The Space Program?

Obama has gutted the manned space program, has canceled plans to return to the Moon, set back the goal of exploring Mars, and is in the process of gutting NASA -- but at least he doeshavepriorities, according to NASA Administrator Charles Bolden in this interview with al-Jazeera.

Bolden: I am here in the region - its sort of the first anniversary of President Barack Obama's visit to Cairo - and his speech there when he gave what has now become known as Obama's "Cairo Initiative" where he announced that he wanted this to become a new beginning of the relationship between the United States and the Muslim world. When I became the NASA Administrator - before I became the NASA Administrator - he charged me with three things: One was that he wanted me to re-inspire children to want to get into science and math, that he wanted me to expand our international relationships, and third, and perhaps foremost, he wanted me to find a way to reach out to the Muslim world and engage much more with predominantly Muslim nations to help them feel good about their historic contribution to science, math, and engineering.

Now I have a number of thoughts here that are nut suitable for publication (including some First Amendment questions), but I will raise just two points here.

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Obama #15? No Way!

I've debated whether or not I really wanted to make any sort of observation abouttherecentSienasurveyofhistory profs in which Obama ranked #15. After all, my contempt for Obama is such that I'm probably not the best guy to evaluate his presidency right now. But then again, that is precisely my point -- right now, none of us are really in a position to fairly and accurately evaluate his presidency in an objective manner.

I've long argued that it is not fair to even include a president in such rankings for at least 15-20 years after his term in office is up. As such, I believe we cannot even rank Bill Clinton fairly, much less Obama or George W. Bush. Indeed, I believe we are only now getting to the point where we can rank George H. W. Bush in something of a dispassionate light, although his son't later presidency does tend to make doing so more difficult for many partisans on both sides of the aisle.

And in the case of Barack Obama, one cannot make a fair evaluation of him after little more than 1/3 of a single term in office, much less legitimately place him on the doorstep of the top 1/3 of American presidents. There is too much we do not know about him and his policies, too much about their medium and long term effects, to really evaluate whether of not they had the desired effect or whether they were in fact deleterious in their impact.

Think about it for just a minute. The economy remains in the tank, and even appears to be sliding backwards in terms of any recovery we may have briefly seen. Militarily, we've just come off of the highest death toll in Afghanistan during the entire war, and the commanding general had to be relieved because Obama was unable to command the respect of a military officer he appointed and who had voted for for him in the presidential election. Yes, health care legislation passed, but it is unpopular with the American people and is in large part not scheduled to go into effect until 2014. If current polling data proves accurate, it is probable that his party will go down to an ignominious defeat in the midterm election. His own liberal coalition is turning against him for having failed to be liberal enough for their tastes. Yes, he received the Nobel Peace Prize, but that award is seen as a joke by most folks given that he had no deeds to his credit to justify winning it in the first place. At this point, the signs point towards Obama being a failure, not a success. But then again, I making these assessments in the midst of his administration, as an admitted partisan.

And that is the point -- a president's place in history is like fine wine or vintage champagne, not fast food. I can still remember the funeral of Harry Truman shortly before my 10th birthday, and the commentators noting that his presidency was not looked upon highly by Americans at the time or in the years leading up to his death. Where does Truman rate now? Top 10, along with the equally disdained-in-the-wake-of-his-presidency Dwight Eisenhower. What happened? Temporal distance allowed for historical objectivity to develop and appropriate reevaluations to be made. I believe that we will see something similar with regards to Clinton, Dubya, and Obama -- and I suspect that time will not be so kind to Clinton or Obama, while showing Bush 43 to be a better president than partisans, polemicists, and professors now give him credit.

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All valid comments, though as to Bush's place in history, I think it is quite dependant on whether partisan left wing history prof's still dominate academia 20 years hence. You can see the same thing occuring in Britain, where Britain's history professors named as the finest Prime Minister of History . . . . (drum roll please) . . . Clement Attlee. Yes, Attlee, whose sole claim to fame is that, after WWII, he took Britain firmly into the socialist camp, complete with governmnet ownership of most major industries, was listed as the best. And that at a time long after his socialist experiment proved to be an economic failure and was repudiated by the Labour Party. Winston Churchill, the man who gets my vote as the greatest historical figure of the 20th century, the man who had the prescience to argue circa 1918 that Britain needed to join in the White Revolution against Lenin's communists, who in the 1930's argued that Britain should have kept the Sauds and Wahhabists from conquering Arabia, and in the 1930's councilled preemptive action to topple Hitler . . . . he came in second to Clement Attlee. Utterly ridiculous. As is Sienna survey.

I'm not so shy -- I'll already place a BET that he will wind up the worst PotUS in US History, with a legacy of failure and incompetence in both Foreign and Domestic policy to rival and even surpass that of the former worst, Jimmy Carter. I predicted that when Big 0 got the Dem nomination, and I have seen nothing whatsoever -- to make me question the prediction in any way, shape, or form... there is not one iota of doubt in my mind where any rational person (hence excluding 95% of all currently tenured history prof) would place The 0 in 30 years time.

Bill Clinton ranked poorly because he was amoral scum who shamed the office, but he did manage to at least get certain parts of it right.

I have serious reservations that our fellow citizens will wake up and realize that they have, w elected a man who is frankly corrupt and incompetent. My concern is that our people will reelect Obama and maintain the democratic majority in the senate and house. 56% of the women in this country voted for this man-I just don't understand what they were thinking. I hope my fears are unfounded but I just don't have confidence in the american people and I believe
regrettably that we will follow Spain, Greece and Venezuela and we will lose our country.And in the end we have only ourselves to blame for such stupidity.

Remember -- We'll Be Relying On These Folks Once the Shuttle Is Grounded

As Barry Hussein prepares to destroy the manned space program and as layoffs of irreplaceable personnel who are key to that program begin here in Houston and at other NASA locations around the US, this incident ought to cause thinking people (a category which does not include Obama) to ask if that plan is a good one.

An unmanned Russian cargo vessel experienced problems during a docking with the International Space Station on Friday, the Interfax news agency reported, citing the commander of the orbital station.

The Progress cargo ship "is moving away from us," Interfax quoted cosmonaut Alexander Skvortsov as saying in a communication with Russian mission control outside Moscow. He was quoted as saying the cargo ship was "spinning uncontrollably" and later that it had disappeared from view.

Of course, neither science nor economics are at the heart of the plan. As one local Democrat NASA employee approvingly notes, this is about Obama giving a little payback to government employees from congressional districts and states that did not vote for him and where the people are not supportive of his radical changes for America.

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A Question About Al Gore

As the denials by Al Gore about the "crazed sex poodle" allegations by a Portland masseuse gain traction, there is a question which must be asked by every concerned American -- indeed, by every person on the planet.

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July 02, 2010

Threatened Honor Killing Of Harry Potter Actress

It isn't what is said in this article that is telling -- it is what is not said.

A Harry Potter actress has fled her home after her father and brother allegedly threatened to kill her.

Afshan Azad, 22, who has appeared in four of the blockbuster movies as Padma Patil, is now believed to be staying with friends in London.

Her father Abdul Azad, 54, and brother Ashraf Azad, 28, both of Longsight in Manchester, were arrested and charged.

Both are accused of threatening to kill her.

Ashraf Azad is also accused of assaulting his sister causing her actual bodily harm.

They appeared at Manchester Magistrates’ Court on Tuesday and the case was adjourned until July 12 for committal proceedings to crown court.

They had been in custody until this week’s court appearance when they were bailed.

As part of their bail conditions, they have to abide by an 11pm to 6am curfew and must not travel to London or contact an unnamed man.

And that last sentence above is the kicker -- the one that the media does not really want to delve into but which makes it pretty clear that the Azad men were out to make an example of Afshan because she had somehow disgraced the family by seeing a man who they found unacceptable. So, in keeping with the pattern that we have seen time and again, they assaulted her and threatened her with death. Indeed, I guess we could say that they qualify as "moderate Muslims" because of this -- after all, usually Muslim men in such situations do not allow their victims to escape with their lives.

Abdul Azad, 54, and his son Ashraf, 28, are accused of attacking actress Afshan Azad earlier this month because of her relationship with a Hindu man, a spokesman for the Crown Prosecution Service said. The family is Muslim.

ObamaCare To Exclude Those With Pre-Existing Conditions

“There are going to be meaningful premiums that are going to be required to stay in this plan — premiums in the hundreds of dollars every month,” [Richard] Popper [deputy director of the Office of Consumer Information and Insurance Oversight at HHS] said. “There are a significant number of people out there with pre-existing conditions who are uninsured, but a significant number of those people ... also have limited income. And some of them, while they may need this plan, the premiums may not be something they can afford.

“We have that to think about as well,” he added. “But for those who can afford it, this is going to be a great, great plan.”

In other words, America was sold a bill of goods by the Obama Regime and its Congressional allies. The new government plan will have the same flaws that the current private sector plans have -- with the additional flaws that come from having government in charge rather than the benefits of private sector competition and efficiency. After all, the government doesn't have to care if you are happy with the product when you don't have anywhere else to turn.

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Chicago's Mayor Richard Daley is seeking to impose draconian controls on the exercise of constitutional rights in the wake of Monday's Supreme Court decision in McDonald v. Chicago. Under Mayor Daley's proposed new law, you'll have the right to own a book -- just not remove it from your home. And you won't be able to buy books in the city, either.

With the city's ban on books certain to be overturned, Mayor Richard Daley on Thursday introduced what city officials say would be the strictest ordinance in the United States to regulate such reading material.

The measure, which draws from ordinances across the country, would ban book shops in Chicago and prohibit book owners from stepping outside their homes, even onto their porches or garages, with a book."

Yeah, I know that freedom of the press is a fundamental right under the Constitution, and that the right to read is one of those liberties that Americans take for granted -- but damn it, books contain ideas and ideas are dangerous things, given that they can spur people to think dangerous thoughts that might not be in keeping with the ideas that government officials and petty bureaucrats want the governed to accept. It is therefore important that, for purposes of keeping good order in our society, that books be regulated and tightly restricted, even if they cannot be banned outright. To Hell with the First Amendment!

UPDATED: Oh, wait -- I apparently got things all messed up when I copied that article. Here is the corrected version.

With the city's ban on handguns certain to be overturned, Mayor Richard Daley on Thursday introduced what city officials say would be the strictest ordinance in the United States to regulate such weapons.

The measure, which draws from ordinances across the country, would ban gun shops in Chicago and prohibit gun owners from stepping outside their homes, even onto their porches or garages, with a handgun.

Still, the analysis above remains the same. Just as the right to print, sell, possess, and read a book is fully protected under the First Amendment, the right to keep and bear arms is equally protected under the Second Amendment. It does not matter if one uses the doctrine of incorporation via the Equal Protection clause to apply it to the states (as was done by the plurality in McDonald v. Chicago) or believe that the more expansive Privileges or Immunities clause to reach the same result (as was done by Justice Thomas), it is clear that Mayor Daley is seeking to become a latter-day George Wallace in his efforts to "stand in the gun shop door" declaring "gun control today, gun control tomorrow, gun control forever" as the people of his city seek to exercise their rights under the the Second Amendment.

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Kagan Won't Affirm Jeffersonian Values At Heart Of American System

KAGAN: Senator Coburn, t-t-to be honest with you, I -- I -- I don't have a view of what are natural rights, independent of the Constitution. And my job as a justice will be to enforce and defend the Constitution and other laws of the United States.

COBURN: So you wouldn't embrace what the Declaration of Independence says, that we have certain God-given, inalienable rights that aren't given in the Constitution? That they're ours and ours alone and that government doesn't give those to us?

KAGAN: Senator Coburn, I believe that the Constitution is an extraordinary document, and I'm not saying I do not believe that there are rights pre-existing the Constitution and the laws, but my job as a justice is to enforce the Constitution and the laws.

The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.

Got that? We the People don't just have the rights spelled out explicitly in the Bill of Rights, we have other rights, referred to in the Ninth Amendment as "others retained by the people." And Kagan won't clarify whether or not she believes in those rights, or whether she is merely a legal positivist who believes that we only have those rights that government deigns to grant us explicitly. And that, my friends, is at odds with the great statement at the heart of the Declaration of Independence, one that I make sure that my students know by heart -- We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

Justice Kagan apparently has not taken the time to figure out the founding documents of the American Republic. As such, she is manifestly unfit for any judgeship -- indeed, I'd argue that she is singularly unqualified for the position she holds in the Obama Regime today, and probably for the deanship at Harvard that she held for so many years. The Senate should reject her based upon this alone.

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Thomas Jefferson also asked, "Can the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have removed their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are of the gift of God? That they are not to be violated but with his wrath?"

Kagan represents a serious threat to the foundations upon which America was built and has no business being considered for any position in the courts much less at the highest level.

On Friday at 10:30 p.m., WHYY TV12 airs "The Surge: The Untold Story," a 35-minute documentary about President Bush's 2007 troop buildup in Iraq.

* * *

To accompany the airing, the station planned a live panel discussion for Thursday hosted by the Lancaster philanthropist and former ambassador Marilyn Ware.

The panel, almost identical to one that accompanied the film's premiere in November at the National Press Club in Washington, was canceled; the station is considering revisiting it in the fall.

The decision to scrap the panel came in the second week in June, according to a publicist for the film, and followed a protest by retired psychology professor Curtis Thomsen of Doylestown, a member of the station's Mercury Society Silver Circle, open to those who donate at least $2,500 annually. Thomsen vowed to cut off his contributions and write the station out of a $200,000 bequest in his will, and he sent a mass e-mail to other WHYY supporters decrying a "Republican Takeover of WHYY."

In this case, the station admits its political cowardice. If they had any integrity at WHYY, they would have told him to take his money and shove it. But instead, they did what their personal inclinations would have been in the first place.

I wonder -- how much outrage would there have been if a conservative donor got a liberal panel canceled because of its political content? And over such a relatively small amount of cash, too.

Another Reason To Love Greg Abbott

Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott today demanded that President Obama send more troops to the Texas-Mexico border and used the shots that hit El Paso City Hall as an example of increased violence on the border.

Abbott said in a letter that the seven shots that hit City Hall in El Paso were an example of the violence that is plaguing the border area and that sending 1,200 National Guard soldiers to the entire U.S.-Mexico border is not enough.

He also cited the violence in Juarez and said that Americans lives are at risk.

"More than 1,300 people have been murdered in Juárez this year as a war continues relentlessly between the Juárez and Sinaloa drug cartels," he told Obama.

He also said the "time for talk has passed."

How many Americans will have to die as Mexico;'s lawlessness spills across our southern border before Obama takes serious action instead of makes proposals to legalize the criminals already here in the US?

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The violence in Mexico will continue until the social conservative's insane war on drugs is halted. There's a direct correlation between infusions of our money into Mexico's hopelessly corrupt government, and escalations of violence and death there.

The drug war and particularly cannabis prohibition create a lucrative, tax free market that is thriving despite 40 years escalating attempts to make a bad idea work. Apparently, we learned very little from alcohol prohibition.

If you want to hit the drug cartels where it really hurts, legalize cannabis. It's the bulk of their product and profits, and is crucial to the domestic supply/marketing systems that supply the truly dangerous substances.

Liberal SF Mayor Is Part Owner Of BP Rig

It turns out that San Francisco’s eco-conscious Mayor Gavin Newsom and his wife, Jennifer Siebel Newsom, own a piece of the deepwater rig at the center of the gulf oil disaster.

According to the mayor’s most recently filed economic disclosure statement, last year the couple invested between $10,000 and $100,000 in Transocean Inc. – the company whose ruptured deepwater rig, which is leased to BP, is spewing millions of gallons of oil, endangering wildlife and beaches all along the Gulf Coast.

Just last month, Newsom told the San Diego area East County Magazine that “the environmental catastrophe devastating the Gulf of Mexico is a tragic reminder of why we must take a stand against the oil companies and oppose all offshore drilling off California’s precious coast.”

So it seems that the Newsom family is getting rich off of dirty investments in dirty oil -- either that, or they only believe in protecting the California coast, but not anybody else's.

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NAME: Greg
AGE: 50-ish
SEX: Male
MARITAL STATUS: Married
OCCUPATION: Social Studies Teacher
LOCATION: Seabrook, TX
DISCLAIMER: All posts reflect my views alone, and not the view of my wife, my dogs, my employer, or anyone else. All comments reflect the view of the commenter, and permitting a comment to remain on this site in no way indicates my support for the ideas expressed in the comment.Amazon.com Widgets